New tablets, Playstation 2 and broken HDR

Sorry for not updating for a little while. Hopefully this wont be too long, fingers crossed. I've just noticed the my last blog update was my 200th blog post :D

As I said in my last blog update, my consultant from Hosp A prescribed me 2 new tablets that would hopefully help my tummy pains. He didn't say whether to try them both at the same time or separately, but I decided to try them one at a time so if my tummy pains eased I'd know which tablet it was due to. I was prescribed Spasmonal which helps reduce IBS type cramps and Amitriptyline which lessens the signals from the nerves in the colon, which in turn reduces the pain. I started taking Spasmonal last Fri evening and have been taking it up to 3 times a day with or just before meals (when I remember). Unfortunately my tummy pains don't seem to have improved and were very bad again yesterday afternoon despite taking a tablet with lunch. And I had indigestion all day on Sun which I can only think is due to that as I didn't eat anything different. I'm going to keep trying with the Spasmonal til Fri to give it a week and if there's still no improvement in my tummy pains I'll stop taking that and try the Amitriptyline instead. And if the Amitriptyline doesn't work I'll then try them both together. So hopefully I'll find a solution to my tummy pains, fingers crossed.

I'm still as nocturnal as ever (I was up til 3.30am last night!) but if I try Amitriptyline from the weekend I'm hopeful that that might help my sleep too.

My dietician doesn't want me to email her with my weight until next Tue because we're doing it fornightly now, but I decided to weigh myself anyway this morning. And my weight was up from 52.1kg to 52.8kg :)

My transition has continued to worry me and I've had trouble sleeping on a couple of nights because of that :( I'm still planning to email S about how things currently work with me under Hosp B, but haven't written that email yet. I spoke to my friend A (who is a similar age to me) from Hosp B last week and her transition isn't moving as quickly as mine, she's not sure when she'll leave Hosp B yet.

On Fri I received a letter from Hosp B with my last Tac level and saying that I needed all my bloods repeated in a fortnight. The letter was dated last Mon but I saw my consultant on Wed and he said because my bloods were all back within the normal range I didn't need bloods doing for 3 months this time. So I'm going to ignore the letter.

When I put all my tablets out for the week ahead on Sun I realised I was low on Tacrolimus (my anti rejection drug). I currently have that delivered by a healthcare company, so the shortage suggests that I didn't get the right amount with the last delivery as I don't usually run out between the regular deliveries. So I phoned them up yesterday and they're going to deliver some more tomorrow, which is good as I'd run out on Sun otherwise.

I've been keeping updated with Rachy's progress on her blog here. It was great to hear that she was able to come off the ventilator on Fri but unfortunately she then had a setback so had to be ventilated again and is still on the ventilator at the moment. I know her journey to recovery will take a while but she's very strong. I sent her a card yesterday. I wanted to make one, but didn't get round to it, so ended up buying her a nice one instead. If you want to send her a card the address is on her blog.

I showed my mum Holly C's Give and Let Live photography book a few days ago and like me, she loved it. So mum has now ordered her own copy of it from Holly :)

And my friend Emily was on Channel 5 news last week. You can see it here.

Last Wed evening I didn't do much after the clinic. But I did attempt to get some tickets for my family to see an episode of QI being filmed in the summer. I'm still waiting to hear if my ticket request has been successful, so fingers crossed. And I bought myself this wall decal from eBay, which arrived in the post this morning. I'll post photos once it's up :)

I've been out a few times in the last week. I didn't get out on Thur because I was very tired from the clinic the previous day. But on Fri I was feeling much better so I joined mum and her friend having lunch out at a restaurant in town. I rarely eat out so that was nice :) It was an Italian restaurant though and I'm not allowed to eat shellfish or blue cheese and I don't like tomatoes (or tomato sauce) and pizza. So it was difficult finding something to eat on their menu! I ended up having a chicken and mushroom risotto, but instead of the tomato sauce I had a garlic sauce on it instead. After the meal we looked round the shops and I just bought one DVD (Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring). I also called in at Barnardo's to pick up an application form, but they'd run out. So they took my address and will post me one out when they get some more. All the staff in the shop were lovely :) Once we got home I popped out to the surgery to pick up my new tablets and to the local shop to post back a rental DVD and withdraw some money from the cash machine.

On Saturday I was exhausted so didn't get out. But on Sun I felt better so had a lovely day. Mum didn't want a present for Mothers Day, but when I saw this pair of earrings I knew she'd love them so had to buy them for her. I had to let her know about them though so she could choose which colour she wanted. She went for purple like I thought she would. I ordered them from Folksy on Fri morning, they were dispatched later that day and they arrived on Sat so I could give them to mum on Sun! And she loves them :D

On Sun morning while dad was out swimming and picking Alf up from a friend's house where he'd spent the night, me and mum went to the local carboot sale to browse round. I love the return of the slightly warmer weather :) Mum was very happy with what she bought. I bought 6 DVDs at bargain prices, so they totalled just £4.50! Unfortunately I assumed they'd all be European DVDs but once I got home I discovered I was wrong - 3 of them were from different regions and so I can't watch them :( I can't unlock either of the DVD players in the house to play different region discs and my laptop wont either. The 3 DVDs that I bought which will play are Closer, Breakfast at Tiffany's and Lost in Translation. The 3 DVDs which wont play are Sense and Sensibility, Little Women and The Net. I'm not too bothered about Sense and Sensibility and Little Women, I'll just rent them at some point instead. But I was very disappointed about The Net because I was really looking forward to watching it as it stars Sandra Bullock. I tried to order a cheap copy from Amazon marketplace but that order was cancelled because they were out of stock. The only other copies available were a bit more expensive so I decided to hold off buying it until I've watched a rental copy. So I added it to my DVD rental list (as a high priority choice) on Sun and it was dispatched yesterday so I received it this morning :)

Mum and dad went to Chris and Sophie's for lunch on Sun but I stayed at home. Then when mum and dad got back us 3 went to visit my Nan. I should have guessed that we wouldn't be the only ones visiting her on Mother's Day afternoon, but I didn't give it a thought so was quite surprised when some other relatives were there. Dad's brother and his wife (who's wedding anniversary meal we went to last month) were there as well as their daughter (my cousin). I was a bit worried when we got there because there were more people than I expected, but it went ok. Because there were 7 of us there though there were often 2 or 3 conversations going at once, eek! My Nan was really pleased to see us all. And my uncle didn't mention my ME but was odd as usual :P His wife was lovely like she always is. And it was great to see my cousin as I'd not seen her for years. I think she might be in her 30s but I'm not really sure - I'm rubbish at guessing ages. I don't think many families would have such deep and lengthy conversations about marijuana like my family do, lol!

My Nan saw the cardiologist yesterday after months of waiting. The big relief is that she doesn't need an operation. Phew. Her heart problem are just related to her age. I don't know much more because my parents spoke to her on the phone, but she seemed very positive after seeing the cardiologist :)

And I had a nice time on Sun eve doing a jigsaw with my mum that she'd bought at the carboot sale that morning :)

On Sun eve I also discovered that Alf had pierced his own lip! I don't mind piercings but the idea of having one in your mouth is weird and self piercing - yuk! Alf said he did it himself because he didn't have enough money to pay to have it done. But he didn't get organised in advance with anything to put in it so by the time he got something from a friend at college yesterday the piercing had closed up. He'll probably attempt it again though. Mad!

I was surprised that I didn't feel exhausted yesterday after such a busy day on Sun. So me and mum went into town for a couple of hours to look round the shops (especially the charity shops). We also stopped for drinks in a coffee shop and called in the library where I borrowed a DVD (The Darjeeling Limited, mum's friend recommended when we saw her last Fri). I only bought one DVD (The Secret Garden) and I looked for some new slippers, because my current ones are falling apart, but with no success.

While we were in town yesterday afternoon afternoon I looked at the prices of some Playstations and Playstation 2s. I'm always surprised at how many PS1 and PS2 games there are in some charity shops and at the carboot sales we go to and how cheap they are. So I'd been thinking about picking up a second hand Playstation or Playstation 2 for a while but hadn't seen any at carboot sales recently. So I checked the prices of preowned ones in a couple of shops while we were out yesterday but didn't buy one as I wanted to check prices on the Internet first. Looking at them in shops helped me decide which model I wanted. I decided I wanted to get a Playstation 2 rather than a Playstation because then I would be able to play a wider range of games on it and I decided I wanted a slim model to fit better next to my Wii on the shelf under my TV. I had a look on the Internet last night and generally they were more expensive than those on the high street apart from on eBay. I tried to bid for a couple on eBay but I'm rubbish at bidding so either got outbid at the last minute or the price went higher than I was willing to pay. Then I found a perfect bundle available as a buy it now option, so I bought it. It will be delivered on Fri. Within the bundle I bought a silver (much nicer than the black) Playstation 2 slim, 2 controllers, all the relevant leads, a memory card and £10 games! And including postage that cost me £52 which I don't think is bad, especially as a new Playstation 2 without any games is selling for about £100. I only like the sound of 2 of the games (Sonic Heroes and Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King), so the other 8 I'm either going to sell to my older brother Chris or trade in at somewhere like Game.

I'm not going out today but am working through some jobs on my to-do list, such as updating my blog. This morning I received a lovely letter from Lizzy's husband's niece who lives in Burma :) And I also received the latest magazine from PINNT so I'll read that at some point.

Tomorrow we'll be waiting in for my Tac delivery and then that evening Claire is coming round for tea before we go to the cinema to see The Lovely Bones. On Thur afternoon I've got my Pathways to Work appt. I updated my CV the other day because I realised I'd got 3 more voluntary things (related to AYME) to add to it :) On Fri I'll be waiting in for my new Playstation 2 and then playing with it once it arrives :) No plans for Sat yet. And on Sun morn I'm hoping to browse round the local carboot sale again.

I received a letter through the door the other day with details of the next meeting of the teenage discussion group. The next meeting will be next Tue (23rd) and will be at the house of one of the leaders. Hopefully I'll feel well enough to go.

You may remember that shortly before Christmas I attended my first AYME meet-up at Lucy's house. I heard last night that she's planning another meet-up on April 10th, which I'm hoping to attend.

Towards the end of last week I discovered that our hard disc recorder had broken. It had been playing up for a while (it's quite old and has been very well used), but when I checked it I found it had only recorded one of five programmes I'd set it to record. I was able to watch the programmes on iPlayer though. I cleared lots off the hard disc and then did a test recording, which worked. But then when I set it to record manually and it told me it was recording it didn't actually record. Grrr. I've found it quite frustrating not being able to record things this week. I researched new HDRs and found one that looked good which also included a DVD recorder. I offered to go halves with my parents to buy it but dad said no because he thinks it's too expensive. And he thinks the old one will work again if we reformat the hard disc, but I'm doubtful. And even if it appears to work better I'm not sure I'll be able to trust it again. If we reformat it the whole hard drive will be wiped so we'll lose everything we've recorded on it. And if we replace it with a new one we'll also lose everything we've recorded. I've been watching through lots of the recorded programmes this week in preparation for losing them all. There are 2 recordings that I really don't want to lose though - Holly S's Battlefront programme (because it's something I was involved with) and an old Japanese film called Escapade in Japan (because it features parts of Japan I've been to, but it isn't available on DVD). Luckily Holly's Battlefront programme is repeated later this week (Fri morning at 4.45am if you missed it last time round) so I'm going to ask my friend Lizzy if she can record it to DVD for me. And I'll just have to lose the Japanese film, never mind.

So on TV this week I've watched the final episode of Syrian School, Film 2010, one part of Crufts 2010, a documentary called Too Poor for Posh School, a programme about Pink which featured an interview with her and some performances, Fri Night with Jonathan Ross (featuring Johnny Depp and Tim Burton), a fascinating documentary called The Pixar Story, Fri Night with Jonathan Ross (no Cheryl Cole as planned, but Charlotte Church and James Corden), an programe about Ellie Goulding which featured performances and a very short interview, an interesting programme about a railway journey through Japan, a documentary called Geisha Girl, the latest episode of Married Single Other (which was very sad), a BBC programme about kidney transplants called Diet or my Husband Dies and the music channels.

I've rewatched Finding Nemo this week and have also watched some new films. I loved Sunshine Cleaning and Erin Brockovich and would highly recommend them both. I also watched a weird film called The Virgin Suicides and started a film that I recorded from the TV many months ago called Framed, but I didn't want to finish it.

I've listened to some music as usual including Pixie Lott, Ellie Goulding and Marina and the Diamonds. I was happy to discover that Marina's next single will be I Am Not A Robot, which I think is a great song :)

And I've continued to play on my newest DS game, Yoshi's Island.

I've just remembered that Lou posted a meme on her blog recently (you can see it here), so I'll give it a go as I conclude this blog update.

Give me 5 foods you never want to eat:
~ Peanut butter - it just has the most disgusting texture, yuk.
~ Mince -it has a weird texture which I don't like.
~ Offal - the idea is just horrible.

And I'm stuck. There are other foods I don't like, but I don't want to say never to any of them as I might like them when I try them again in the future. I've only been eating for 3 years so I'm still discovering new foods and some take a few tries for me to decide I like.