Getting up to date with April - part 9 (music and mum's knitting)

In the weeks since my last update I've been enjoying listening to lots of music and reading and watching interviews with some of my favourite artists. When a song name is a hyperlink, clicking on it will let you watch the video for the song on Youtube.

Marina and the Diamonds has had a lot of publicity recently to promote her latest single. I read an interview with her in a local magazine and saw her being interviewed and/or performing on Loose Women, Live from Channel 5 and BBC Breakfast (which you can see here). I thought she was fantastic performing 2 songs on Later with Jools Holland. Unfortunately the programme isn't available on iPlayer any more but you can see the video of her performing I Am Not A Robot on her blog here. She was also on Radio 1's Live Lounge where she was interviewed and performed one of her own songs (I Am Not A Robot) plus a cover (Starstrukk by 3Oh!3), which you can listen to here. I Am Not A Robot was released a couple of weeks ago and despite all the work she did promoting it it didn't chart very well in the Official UK Top 40 - it only reached number 26 the first week and then fell to number 33 this week :( I've really enjoyed listening to her album, The Family Jewels, on repeat lots more and am very happy that I managed to get tickets to see her in concert in Oct (which I blogged about here).

Diana Vickers has also been doing a lot of interviews and TV appearances recently promote the release of her debut single and debut album. I read an interview with her in a local magazine and saw her on GMTV, Something for the Weekend, Live from Channel 5 and a T4 programme. She was also on Radio 1's Live Lounge where she was interviewed and performed one of her own singles (Once) plus a cover (Just Say Yes by Snow Patrol), which you can listen to here. Hew debut single Once charted at number one in Official UK Top 40 the week it was released. It's really catchy and will get stuck in your head. Her debut album, Songs from the Tainted Cherry Tree, is out now and made number one in Official UK Album chart yesterday. She put her album up on her MySpace page the week before it was released so I enjoyed listening to it there and now it's released I can listen to it on Spotify. It took a few listens but I love it now. I'll buy the album at some point when it's dropped in price a bit so I can put it on my iPod but for now I'm happy listening to it on my laptop through Spotify. I was faced with a bit of a dilemma when I discovered that Diana would be performing at a venue in my local city tonight. I'd love to see her live but this concert was standing only and I know I'd be in a lot of pain if I attended a standing concert. So I was sensible and decided not to go. I'm hoping she'll do some seated concerts in the future, fingers crossed.

Mika's latest single, Kick Ass (from the film with the same title), was released about a week ago. Unfortunately it didn't chart within the Official UK Top 40 :( I've listened to Mika's music a lot recently as it works well to cheer me up when I'm feeling down :) Unfortunately I still don't seem to have learnt that listening to Mika late at night isn't a good idea because it make me go hyper, hehe :P

I've also enjoyed listened to Ellie Goulding's album, Lights. I'd not listened to it for a little while, but then I heard Under The Sheets when I was in HMV last week and it reminded me how much I like Ellie Goulding's music. I saw her interviewed and performing on a C4 programme called 5.19 a few days ago promoting her new single Guns and Horses, which hasn't been released yet.

Me and mum listen to the radio a lot and tend to alternate between Heart, Radio 2 and Radio 1 to avoid adverts, boring talking bits and songs we don't like. Mum enjoyed dancing to the radio the other day when Never Forget You by the Noisettes was played as it brought back memories of seeing them in concert :) I've been hearing a song called I Need You Now by Lady Antebellum on the radio a lot recently and I think it sounds just like Taylor Swift.

Some new videos I've seen on the music channels over the last few weeks are Turn It Up by Pixie Lott (which I love), All Night Long by Alexandra Burke (which I quite like, but I hate the rapping), Umbrella Beach by by Owl City (which is growing on me), Bittersweet by Sophie Ellis Bextor (which I don't mind), On Your Head by Tiffany Page (we saw her supporting the Noisettes and although her new song is catchy I'm not very keen on her) and Hearts Don't Lie by Gabriella Cilmi (I loved her first album, but don't like her new change of direction although On A Mission was catchy). I also heard JLS' next single The Club Is Alive on Radio 1 this morning although there isn't a video for it yet. I don't mind the singles that JLS have released so far, but don't like their latest one after the first listen.

I thought you might like to see some of my mum's latest knitting creations :)

An entrelac cushion for my uncle and aunt's 45th (Sapphire) wedding anniversary

A knitted string bag

An Adipose from Doctor Who

A handpuppet
(My mum helps out with organising shoeboxes filled with toys to go to children in war-torn countries each year at Christmas. They don't allow stuffed toys to be included unless they have a special mark on them to prove they're safe, so mum can't knit stuffed toys for the boxes. She thought she'd try to knit hand puppets instead as they don't include any stuffing.)

A very cute cat made from simple knitted shapes

A very cute tortoise for me (you can see how tiny it is in Alf's hand)

A turtle for Alf

Mum modelling her knitted moustache for my nan!

My blog is now pretty much up-to-date :) I've not blogged about today yet but I'll do another update shortly when I've got a couple of days to write about. And tomorrow I'm hoping to do a blog about ME Awareness Week 2010.

My weekend, health and Rachy

On Fri morn I felt quite depressed at all the election stuff. I'm not going to talk much about it here because I'm sure you're all fed up with politics now, but I was disappointed that Lib Dems did so badly and that the Tories got the most votes. I'm also concerned about what a coalition will mean especially if it ends up being between the Lib Dems and the Tories because they have such contrasting views.

That morn me and mum went out to see my nan though and that really cheered me up :) The first thing she asked me was whether I'd got my iPod with me because she was really keen to listen to some more music. I let her listen to Blue Eyes by Mika which she enjoyed but she said she preferred Marina and the Diamonds, so I let her listen to I Am Not A Robot. She loved that and was tapping her feet and singing along :) Next time I visit her I'm going to take her a copy of Marina's album and teach her how to play it through her DVD player or laptop. Mum and dad have also told me that she's just bought herself a new digital camera so I've got to teach her how to use that. I suspect it'll be a long job because she'll want to know what every button and every function do! :P

My copy of the latest issue to the Official Nintendo Magazine had arrived in the post that morn so I just relaxed and read that in the aft.

On Fri I received the email from S at Hosp A that she'd promised me before the end of the week and I'm not very happy. She basically said that they do things similarly to Hosp B but told me that I'll need to have my Tac blood taken at clinic because they don't use Tac kits. Then she confirmed the dates of the next clinic and said she'd see me there. That was the entire content of the email I'd waited 6 weeks for! The plan for these 3 months was for me to become happier about communication with the team and for me to find out how things will work when I'm under Hosp A. Neither of those things have happened - I've discovered that being told a reply will take one week can turn into 6 weeks and I still have no idea at all how they do things at Hosp A. Aaarrrggghhh! I'm really worried about this transition as I still have no confidence in the Hosp A team. I don't think they'll be any better with communication once Hosp B are out of the picture and that worries me. And I don't want to find out how they do things when they need to do them and then discovering the problems, I want to know in advance so stuff can be sorted out.

On Fri eve Claire came round for tea and we had a nice time together playing a card game called Ligretto, chatting and playing on my Wii :)

Yesterday (Sat) I had a pyjama day and can't think of much interesting to report about it :P I finalised an information page for Transplant Kids with Emma and enjoyed watching Doctor Who, rewatching Ashes to Ashes from the previous night and rewatching episode 6 of the second series of Outnumbered. I also watched a funny film called Zombieland. I don't usually watch horror films but this was a horror comedy and I was surprised at how much I enjoyed it.

I've had a lazy day again today (Sun) because I've been very tired. I enjoyed playing on New Super Mario Bros Wii for a little while and watching a film called Stardust. Lizzy recommended Stardust to me a little while ago but I kept putting off renting it because I don't usually enjoy fantasy films. But Tesco DVD rental sent it out to me so I tried it and was surprised at how much I enjoyed it. Today I also watched 2 episodes from series 2 of Outnumbered with my parents.

This evening I noticed that I'm running short on high calorie puddings so will need to give another prescription in at the surgery soon to get some more. But I thought before I do that I'd email my dieticians and ask them if I can stop having the high calorie puddings now because my weight is doing so well. I sent that email tonight so hope for positive replies within the next couple of days, fingers crossed. The high calorie puddings are the best high calorie supplements I've come across, but they're still not very pleasant and I can think of other foods I'd much rather eat instead.

I'm having serious problems with my mobile phone at the moment, grrr. I don't know if the 2 problems are connected or separate. The battery isn't fully charging and won't hold its charge so it's running down within less than 12 hours at the moment (compared to the week or longer that it used to hold it's charge for) which is really frustrating. The obvious solution to that would be to buy another battery and I've found that they're very cheap on eBay. But I've done some enquiring and it seems that the battery running down so quickly might be because the phone is having to work extra hard to get signal as the other problem I'm having at the moment is having no signal in places I'd usually have full signal. My phone only needs to last til the end of Sept and has never had any problems before so I didn't know what to do. I phoned Chris this eve and he said that he thought the signal problems might be because the battery level is often low, so he suggested buying a new battery and seeing if that helps. So I ordered one from eBay tonight. Hopefully that'll arrive soon and fix the signal problem as well as the battery problem, fingers crossed.

This weekend my parents have been getting some of the Glastonbury stuff out to start preparing (Glastonbury is at the end of June). It's usually just dad and Alf that go so they've only got 2 sleeping mats, 2 sleeping bags etc, but mum is going with them this year (I'm staying at home in the warm and dry!) so they're having to sort out what mum needs to buy. They ordered her a sleeping mat and sleeping bag today online. When mum was trying out dad's sleeping bag the other day dad zipped it right up so she completely disappeared inside! I wish I'd had my camera handy! Mum has never slept in a sleeping bag before so that'll be a new experience for her. When she was trying out dad's she discovered it was too narrow for her to lie comfortably in (she sleeps in a weird position that's hard to explain in words), so dad ordered her a wider one. Mum has also ordered a clever gadget called a Shewee.

I've not got many plans for this week at the moment. Tomorrow (Mon) I'm going to visit my nan with mum to help her sort through her books and hopefully get rid of some. My nan isn't very good at getting rid of things though :P And my only other plan for this week is a physio appt on Wed aft.

Since I did the last blog post about my health as part of my big blog update I've though of a few more things to post about. My dizziness completely disappeared from last Sat eve to Tue eve which was fantastic. It then came back again but wasn't nearly as bad as before and I was only getting maybe one very brief and mild dizzy spell each day, which was a relief. However tonight while I've been sitting at my laptop I've been feeling quite dizzy despite sitting still, so I think I might try to make a GP appt tomorrow to get this checked out.

I sometimes go through spells of getting coldsores and have had a couple over the last few weeks. Sometimes they occur when I'm run down but I don't think my health is worse than usual at the moment. I thought the first one might have been caused by being out in the sun but the second one came in the gloomy weather so I don't know. They can be so sore and annoying though. Fingers crossed I won't get any more for a while.

I have been very nocturnal recently, which is annoying but I'm just trying to learn to live with it now. Going to sleep at about 4am the other night meant I probably didn't get enough sleep though.

My dad has recently self diagnosed himself with plantar fasciitis (the foot problem I have) in one of his feet. He wouldn't stop moaning about it when he first decided that was what it was - typical men! But he read on the Internet that stretching could cure it (my GP told me there was no cure) and now he's been stretching he says it's a lot better. At least he's stopped moaning so much now.

As I've mentioned before, my dad has recently started enjoying swimming and goes most days now. However we suspect he might be a bit allergic to some aspect of it because he always comes back sniffing and sneezing! Dad mentioned a few weeks ago that now he's achieved his goal of swimming 1 mile in a swimming pool he wants to try it in open water! I've not heard anything about that recently though so I suspect he might have had second thoughts.

My dad had a go at me the other day because he thought it was lazy of me not to be making my sandwiches at lunch time and asking mum to make them for me instead. After some upset I managed to explain to my parents that I don't like eating at the moment (although I have better days and worse days with that) and so I also don't like having anything more to do with food than I have to. Dad had no idea about the little things I often do around the house to help mum out during the day (emptying and stacking the dishwasher, pegging out and getting washing in, putting washing in the airing cupboard and getting it out and putting it away, going round to the local shop when we run out of things...) so when me and mum told him about that I think it made him see that I'm not being lazy. It was agreed that mum would continue making my sandwiches for me when she's in and I'll keep helping her out around the house.

Rachy has been in the media again a few times recently, she seems to be making really good progress at the moment and even wrote a blog post just over a week ago which you can read here! You can read an article from her local newspaper here, an article from the BBC news website here and you can even hear her talking on BBC Radio Manchester here! The radio programme will only be available to listen to online til Thur morn, so please have a listen before then. Rachy's bit is at 2hrs and 51mins through.

My blog is almost completely up to date now. I just want to write a little bit about what music I've been listening to and share some photos of mum's recent knitting photos with you. I was going to put the photos up tonight, but they're not on my laptop at the mo so I'll have to get them from the family computer tomorrow. I'm also going to do a post in the next few days about ME Awareness Week 2010 which is running from the 8th to the 16th May.

While I've been writing this up I've put Mika's music on :D I'm not sure why I've not learnt yet that that isn't sensible at this time of night because it makes me go hyper :P

Organ donation in the news, trips out, an AYME meet-up and politics

Whoops for leaving it so long since my last update again. Looking at my notes from this week I think this update shouldn't be too long, but I never know until I've finished writing it, so fingers crossed.

At the end of last week I developed a rash on my hands and face after going in the sun, despite having factor 50 suncream on. At first I assumed it was a reaction to the sun, but after using a different suncream it seems more likely that it was a reaction to the suncream I used.

I forgot to weigh myself last Tue morn, so did it on Wed instead. My weight was 53.3kg, which was 0.3kg more than the previous week but exactly the same as the week before. It was the week I have to email my dieticians so I let them both know. My Hosp B dietician replied promptly and said she was impressed with how stable my weight was so would be happy for me to weigh myself monthly now. My dietician from Hosp A took a bit longer to reply as she was away for Easter, but she was happy with that too, so I don't need to email them my weight again until May. I'm a bit concerned about how much weight I could potentially lose in a month if I was to start losing weight, so I'm going to weigh myself fortnightly at home for the time being.

Last Wed I took some blood at home from a fingerprick and posted it off to Hosp B for them to check my Tac levels from. I also phoned them to let them know that the blood sample was on its way. I've not heard the result yet, so will chase them up about it later this week.

On Tue I got a phone call from the company who currently deliver my Tac asking how much I had in stock so they could decide if I needed another delivery or not. I was out at the time so they said they'd phone back the next day. They rang back on Wed while I was still in bed, so mum took the phone call. They'll deliver some more Tac a week on Wed.

Rachy is still continuing to make steady progress, so don't forget to keep following her updates here. Rachy had an article in her local paper last week which you can see here.

You may have seen that there was a story about organ donation all over the news yesterday. You can see the story on the Telegraph website here. It's a shame that the media seem to have completely blown the story out of proportion, I really hope it doesn't put people off registering to be an organ donor. You can read LLTGL's blog response here and Sarah has also written about it in her latest blog update here.

Once again I seem to have been quite busy since my last update. On Wed I went into Barnardo's for an hour. For the whole time I was there I was hanging clothes up, which got quite boring. It was very busy and noisy because there were lots of volunteers in. I was the only one doing any work though, the rest of them were just chatting. At least I didn't knock over any boxes of size cubes this time! When I'd finished I wandered round the charity shops in town. From Barnardo's I bought a copy of the DVD Nicholas' Gift which I'd rented and watched just a couple of weeks ago. I was pleasantly surprised to find that I get a staff discount of 20%. In another charity shop I picked up Jungle Book on DVD. I saw a PS1 game in a charity shop that I bought on eBay recently for significantly more money, but never mind.

On Thur it was lovely and sunny so me and mum decided not to go to the cinema but instead to wander round a local town that I'd not been to for a while. While we were out we stopped for drinks and found 7 charity shops :) In the charity shops I bought a book called Ten Thousand Sorrows by Elizabeth Kim for 75p, The Weakest Link PS1 game for £1 and 2 DVDs (Maybe Baby and Silkwood) for just 19p each as they'd originally come free with newspapers. In one of the charity shops I saw a woman who was there with her daughter. This lady was quite demanding with the shop assistants and rude to her daughter. When her daughter was talking to her she responded with 'Am I bothered?' just like the Catherine Tate character, but she wasn't doing it as a joke, that was her genuine response! :P While we were out we also bumped into a lovely nurse from Hosp H that we used to know well, so it was nice to have a quick chat to her.

On Fri morn before I got up, mum and dad went out to a fishing shop in a local city to look for a fishing bag to carry mum's giant knitting needles. They found the perfect one. Alf had planned to go to the cinema with his friends that evening, but they decided to go in the afternoon instead. They couldn't contact Alf because his mobile phone battery was flat, so they just turned up at our house at 12.30pm. Of course at this point Alf was still in bed, so there was chaos as he tried to get himself up and ready to go, especially as I was in the shower at this point! He got out eventually though and enjoyed seeing the film Kick Ass with his college friends.

On Fri aft Claire came round. We did lots of chatting, played a great card game called Ligretto, watched the DVD Coraline together and played on New Super Mario Bros Wii. As well as playing on New Super Mario Bros Wii with Claire, I've also played on it a bit on my own this week and am getting closer to completing it :) Claire is coming round again tomorrow and we're going to see if we can finish it, fingers crossed! I've bought myself a new Wii game this week from Amazon called Boom Blox Bash Party, so hopefully that'll be delivered later this week. I've not played on my PS2 for a little while, but am looking forward to playing on it again :)

On Fri night Alf went round to a friend's house in the village and none of us knew what time he'd be home. Usually we lock up and hide a key somewhere where he can find it to let himself in, but on Fri night the spare key seemed to have disappeared, so my parents decided to leave the door unlocked. At about 1am I was ready for bed, my parents were already asleep but Alf wasn't back yet. I didn't feel comfortable for the front door to be unlocked when we were all in bed, so I crept downstairs, found my spare key and put that out for Alf. I'd just locked the door and crept back upstairs and Alf came in!

On Sat I went to Lucy's AYME meet-up. To get there my parents drove me to a train station about 30mins away. I then got the train to Lucy's town, which took 40mins, where I met up with 2 other people and we shared a taxi to Lucy's house. There were 14 people (more than I expected) at the meet-up, so I became very shy and didn't talk much. I was very annoyed and upset at myself afterwards for that. No-one swapped seats either, so I didn't get chance to talk to some of the people I wanted to and one girl I was looking forward to seeing wasn't able to make it. I was quite tired while I was there, but I wasn't too bad. I'd not given my cat allergy a thought, but my eyes soon started watering thanks to Lucy's 4 cats! One part of the conversation that I found really funny was when some people started talking about blood tests. They'd clearly only ever had a couple of bloods tests because they were talking about cannulas blocking and needles missing veins like really unusual, traumatic events! I've experienced too many of them to count! I was quite tired when I got home, but felt ok the next day.

Yesterday morn some spare Glasto tickets went on sale. Dad had managed to get his and Alf's when they originally went on sale, but he'd not managed to get mum one. Luckily he got her one yesterday morning though. So at the end of June my parents and Alf will be going away to Glasto, which means I'll be at home alone for 6 days! That's exciting but a bit scary! If my health was better I might think about going to Glasto, but I'm not well enough to this year and to be honest I'm not too fussed about missing it - the yukky toilets, lack of showers and mud don't really appeal to me. So while the rest of my family are there in the mud I'll be watching the BBC coverage of it at home all cosy on the sofa :)

Yesterday morn we went to the local carboot sale again. It was much better than it's been for a while and I came home with loads. I bought a 500 piece dolphins jigsaw for 50p, a PS2 game (21 Card Games) for £1, a PS1 game (Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets) for 50p and 14 DVDs, all for £1 each! :D I bought 3 DVDs I've already seen - The Breakfast Club, Music and Lyrics and Rachel Getting Married. I bought 11 DVDs I've not seen before - The Pelican Brief, Brokeback Mountain, Clueless, Signs, The Blair Witch Project, Shakespeare in Love, iRobot, Becoming Jane, The Heartbreak Kid, P.S. I Love You and The Notebook. Mum bought the version of Pride and Prejudice featuring Colin Firth on DVD, some bits and pieces for herself and a book for me about films called Cinematherapy - The Girl's Guide to Movies for Every Mood, which was published in 1999, but still looks like I'll be able to get some DVD suggestions from it.

Yesterday afternoon we went to see my Nan but only stayed for about an hour and a half because dad wanted to get back to watch the football. Yesterday evening mum was listening to her iPod and was singing and dancing to Mika around the house and in the garden, but of course she was the only one who could hear the music! :P

Today my mum has gone to the library in the city to talk to an audience there about her knitting group to inspire them to set up their own. Mum wanted to take loads with her to show the people who come to her talk - her giant needles, lots of different types of yarn, lots of her knitted projects, a cushion she's just knitted etc - she'll be disappointed if only a few people turned up! She didn't have to carry her stuff too far as dad dropped her off as close to the library as he could, just outside the shopping centre that it's situated in, so she only had to walk through the shopping centre and up an escalator. To prevent her having to carry too many bags she put lots of stuff into a backpack. And she's got her giant needles in a fishing rod case. But she looks like a terrorist! Her backpack is one of the camouflage coloured Glasto ones and it's really big in comparison to my mum and the knitting needles in their case look rifle shaped! :P We were worried she might get arrested, but I've spoken to her on the phone and the shopping centre was very empty when she walked through it just before 9am this morning, so there was nobody there to get suspicious.

Last week dad heard that a local bike shop might have a vacancy so after much nagging Alf wrote them a letter to express his interest. Today my dad noticed that Alf had mistyped our phone number in the letter, so Alf phoned them to correct it. I've only been out to the surgery and local shop today. I've been relaxing this afternoon and don't have any plans for this evening. While I was writing this I had to go downstairs to ask Alf to turn his music down as even with my door closed I could hear it and it's horrible! So now he's very grumpy :P

On Wed there was an interesting piece on the local news about what the different political parties want to do about disability benefits. There was a disabled lady asking representatives from the different parties questions about how things will change for her if they get into power. This will be the first election I've been able to vote in, but rather than just copying my parents I wanted to know a bit about what the different parties believe and how their plans differ. However I struggled to find anything on the Internet that told me this in a way I could understand. A couple of days ago someone told me about a guide on the Telegraph website which helps you to find out how the different parties policies match your views. I didn't understand all of the questions in the guide, but I answered as many as I could. It said my views matched the Green Party 75% and matched Lib Dems 69%. My views least matched the Tories, but I didn't bother to include the BNP in my comparison. My parents vote Lib Dem and after looking at their policies in the guide I think I probably will too. The Telegraph guide is definitely worth having a look at, you can find it here.

I've not watched much on TV since my last update. When a programme name is displayed as a link on my blog, that link will take you to the place to watch it online if you're interested. I've watched Embarrassing Bodies: Charlotte's Story, the first episode of series 3 of Outnumbered (which was brilliant) and the second episode of series 3 of Ashes to Ashes twice :) I had to record Dr Who from Sat because I was out, but hope to watch it soon.

One of the DVDs I'm currently renting is the first series of the Catherine Tate Show, so I've watched the first 2 episodes of that. I've not decided what I think of it yet, but am going to persevere. Some of the sketches are funny, but some aren't.

As well as re-watching Coraline on DVD (which I love), I've also watched Sex and the City (which was better than I expected it to be), Little Women (the 1994 version with Winona Ryder, which was very good) and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (a predictable but funny romcom). I also attempted to watch The Pelican Brief, but wasn't able to follow it so I'll have to try it again when my brain is working a bit better.

On Tue night I listened to Taylor Swift through my pillow speaker, but it didn't help me sleep. On Wed I listened to some music from a CD called Temple in the Forest and I fell asleep while listening to that :) I discovered it when I was in hospital after my transplant and it helped me to relax then. A girl I know though AYME is very musical and she's recently released some of her music which is available to buy on iTunes or through Amazon. I'm not sure about her style myself but she is very talented so please have a listen for free on her MySpace page here. A few days ago I discovered that Marina and the Diamonds is performing at a festival that's just down the road from me this summer. I'm not well enough to go, but it's frustrating that she's coming so close yet I'm not going to be able to see her :( I couldn't see her on tour either because all the gigs were standing only. I think I might write to Marina and ask her to include some seated gigs in her next tour ;) Ellie Goulding's latest video has just been uploaded to Youtube today. The song is called Guns and Horses and will be released next month. You can see the video here.

I've also done some crosswords with my mum and some Sudoku.

Discussion group, hair cut and Barnardo's

Sorry it's been a little while since I last updated, hopefully this update wont be too long, fingers crossed.

My tiredness and energy levels have been up and down this week. My mood has too - most of the time I've been fine but I have felt very down on a couple of occasions for no obvious reason. On Sat night my legs were sore which is unusual for me. I started Amitriptyline on Sat night after stopping Spasmonal because it didn't seem to be helping my tummy pains at all. My tummy pains seem to have been different this week than usual and maybe slightly better, but not dramatically better. I'll keep going with the Amitriptyline and see what happens. My nocturnalism seems to have been better some nights this week (but not all) and I seem to have been getting to sleep quicker once I've got into bed, which may be due to the Amitriptyline.

One day this week I received a write-up of my last clinic in the post from Hosp A. The letter has been written to my GP but I received a copy too. On the envelope and in the letter Hosp A got my house number wrong. Hosp B have always had my postcode wrong! :P Most of the letter was accurate but I wasn't very happy with my consultant from Hosp A saying something along the lines of 'It was agreed that Molly's fatigue is probably not due to M.E. but is probably transplant related' That was not agreed, that was just his view!

I finally got my dad to check my email to S, the transplant co-ordinator from Hosp A, and after finalising it I sent it. I received a brief response from S saying that she'd be in touch again after her week off, but the follow up at Hosp B sounds very similar to Hosp A so she thinks my transition should be simple. I wish I was that confident!

On Tue morn my weight was up to 53.3kg. It was 52.1kg a fortnight ago (when I last emailed my dietician at Hosp B) and 52.8kg last week (when I just did my weight for myself). I emailed both of my dieticians to let them know. My dietician from Hosp B was very impressed and I also got a nice reply from my dietician at Hosp A.

On Sun morn me and mum went out to the local carboot sale. We both found it quite disappointing so hopefully it'll be better next time. I didn't buy any DVDs, just one PS2 game.

On Mon I felt quite tired so didn't do much. I wrote a letter to my AYME buddy Kate and went round to the post box to send that and also to the surgery to put in an order for some more high calorie puddings. I didn't feel up to going to Alf's parents' evening with my mum and dad but I'm sure there'll be more chances for me to see his college. That evening dad went away to stay in the fishing lodge that his sister rents for a couple of days while he's on annual leave from work.

On Tue I walked round to the local shop to buy the new Radio Times and some milk and to post a rental DVD back. That morning I phoned Barnardo's to chase up an application form and the manager answered the phone. She asked if I'd been in for an interview so I told her that I'd just been asked to fill out an application form. She said she'd just got back from a holiday but she'd like to see me for an interview, so could I pop in at some point on Wed or Thur. Eeek!

On Tue aft Chris and Soph came round to compare PS games, but Sophie forgot her 4. She told me what they were though and I wouldn't have been interested in borrowing any of them. Chris and Sophie are both quite busy at the mo but they might borrow some of my games another time. We played on my PS2 together which was fun :) After they'd been round for a while I got very tired so went up to my bedroom to relax while they used our Internet because they've not managed to get the Internet set up at their new house yet. Chris did some job hunting. He's still got his current job but they've just lost some housing benefit I think so are struggling to afford the rent on their house. I'm sure they wouldn't have any problems though if they stopped spending so much on things like alcohol, cigarettes, going to the pub etc! So Chris is looking for a job where he can earn more money, but dad doesn't think he'll be able to get a more highly paid job in what he wants to do (bar and restaurant work).

On Tue eve I didn't feel too tired so went to the teenage discussion group in the village. This time rather than being held in a room in the church it was held at B's house because she couldn't get anyone to babysit for her 2 young daughters now we've changed the day. There weren't many of us there - just A and B who run it, me, my friend V and another girl we both know, K. V has told me that she can't stand K, but I thought she did very well at hiding that. The discussion was based around another 10 min video, but it wasn't quite so religious this time. I got a bit frustrated when I was trying to be 'normal' and A briefly mentioned my medical history. I also found it frustrating when B was talking about how her sister had ME and had recovered really quickly when she stopped multitasking and watching TV and I felt like it was pointed at me (I'm sure A had told B about me having ME), but I'm sure nothing was meant by it. I'm really pleased that I didn't say anything either time. The rest of the evening was good though :)

I had quite a busy day on Wed. In the morning I went to my local hair salon for an appt with my normal hairdresser (who has cut my hair since I was tiny). My hair really needed trimming but I'd kept putting it off because I don't like having to be sociable at the hairdressers :P I asked my hairdresser's advice on stopping my hair from looking so thin (I'm sure it's a side effect of some of my medication but it seems to come and go despite the doses of my medications not changing). She said she could see where it went thinner, so the best solution would be to cut my hair there, so I agreed. I don't like other people washing my hair so just went for a spray cut. However when she sprayed my hair it went wildly wavy and stuck out at all angles :P Luckily she managed to tame it a bit before I left the salon. I had 2 or 3 inches cut off which is more than I'd usually have, but my hair still ties up. And I like it, it looks much thicker now and is easier to wash, brush and care for now the split ends have gone.

On Wed aft I went to Barnardo's in town to see the manager. She seemed nice and younger than I'd expected from hearing her on the phone. It wasn't really an interview, just a short informal chat. She asked me if I'd ever done any volunteering like this before (which I haven't) and asked whether I'd like to work out the front or in the back, so I told her about the conversation I'd had with someone on the phone who had suggested that I work out the back so I'm under no pressure to go in unless I feel up to it. She gave me an application form and asked me to return next Thur to be shown around, shown how stuff works and what I'll be doing.

Then I tried to trade in my 5 unwanted PS2 games (there might be more I don't want when I've played them all a bit more, but they're the only ones I'm certain I don't want at the mo) and the shop said they'd definitely be interested and although price would depend on the actual games and the condition of them they would be able to offer me a couple of pounds for each. But they can only buy a certain value of games and consoles each day and they'd already bought their limit that day. So I'll have to go back a bit earlier another day and hope that they wont already have bought their limit. In the charity shops I bought a PS1 game and 2 DVDs (Burn After Reading and He's Just Not That Into You) for £1.50 each. Then I helped mum with a big Tesco shop where I bought The Hangover on DVD for £5.

Yesterday I helped mum with a quick Tesco shop but didn't buy anything myself. Then we called in at the cinema where we pre-booked tickets to see The Blind Side tomorrow. We ate our sandwiches for lunch in the car on our way to visit my Nan. It was lovely to see her and she seemed in good spirits :) But I became very tired while we were there so don't think I was very good company. On the way home we called in at a local shop to buy some croissants and I posted a rental DVD back. I was very tired that evening so relaxed for a while before doing a crossword with my mum which we both enjoyed. Then dad got back from his fishing break which he seemed to have enjoyed. After dad had been back a little while he said there was something different about me so asked if I'd got new glasses. When I told him I hadn't he then realised I'd had my hair cut!

One day this week my mum's friend called round with a big fleecy jacket that she didn't want any more so she wondered if any of us wanted it. It's mine now and I love it, it's so warm :)

On Wed when I'd been telling my hairdresser about Alf's college course and his love of exotic animals she told me about a exotic pet shop that she'd accidentally stumbled upon in a neighbouring village. I'd never heard of it before, but I told Alf who looked it up on the Internet last night. He thought it looked really good so went to have a look at it with dad this afternoon. They don't have any job vacancies for Alf or any chance for him to volunteer but they've taken his details and he will be able to do his work experience there. It's good that it's so close, he'll be able to walk or cycle there across the fields.

This morning I had a shower and it got me thinking. Although I find showering quite tiring at the moment, it's now much easier than it used to be for me because I don't have to spend time before showering waterproofing a central line or spend time after showering changing an illeostomy bag.

I'm having a very down day today :( Firstly Claire text mum to cancel this evening. She was going to come round for tea and bring her mum with her who we've never met before, but she's cancelled and I don't know why. However they're still going to my mum's knitting group, but I don't attend that, so I wont get to see Claire tonight or meet her mum :(

Then I overheard Alf talking to my parents about the possibility of him getting a pet. I've wanted a pet for years and my parents have always said no, so I was surprised that they were thinking about letting Alf have one. So I asked mum if I could have a pet and she said no, which I thought was very unfair so I got quite upset. Mum didn't seem to understand that I like animals as much as Alf and how much I want a pet. Alf isn't going to be getting a pet in the near future but if he makes a big effort with his college work and gets good grades then he might be allowed a chameleon or some other kind of reptile or amphibian in a tank in his room, which he'll have to take full responsibility for. At the end of the conversation it looked more like if Alf is allowed a pet I might be allowed one too, but nothing has been decided yet. If I am allowed a pet then it will have to live in my bedroom (so not a dog or cat) and be totally my responsibility. However due to my transplant I wouldn't be able to have a reptile or a bird, so I think it'll have to be a small mammal. And I'll have to get my consultant's permission too. My consultant at Hosp B has always said no to pets (although I do know other small bowel transplant recipients who have pets), but I think my consultant at Hosp A might say yes ;)

Tomorrow afternoon me and mum are going to the cinema to see The Blind Side which I'm really looking forward to as I've been waiting for the film to be released in UK cinemas for ages! And on Sun if the weather is good we'll go and browse round the local carboot sale. My only plan for next week at the moment is going to Barnardo's on Thur (and maybe getting into town a bit early to try to trade my unwanted PS2 games in), but I'm sure more things will crop up, they always do.

I've played on my PS2 a bit more since my last update. On Sat I played on Sonic Heroes a bit more on my own and tried out World Rally Championship 3 with dad. It was his choice but we both had a lot of laughs playing it because we were both appalling! I was marginally better though, so beat him :) On Sun I tried out a few games - Who Wants to be a Millionaire (just like the TV prog), Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell (not sure if it's my kind of game, so need to spend a bit more time playing it), Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (I expected it to be some exploring and some fighting but it is all fighting so I didn't enjoy it), The Italian Job: LA Heist (I am awful at racing games, so that wasn't very successful!) Tony Hawk's Project 8 (bashing the buttons doesn't work, I need to spend some time learning and practising) and SSX3 (same thoughts as Tony Hawk's). On Tue I tried out the multiplayer options on Sonic Heroes with Chris and Sophie and then played Who Wants to be a Millionaire with Sophie. And on Tue I also tried out a new game, Lemmings for the PS1, which I loved (it's just classic Lemmings), but I got really frustrated when it would save and even complained to the eBay seller who I bought it from. After Googling the problem I discovered that you can't save PS1 games onto a PS2 memory card, but instead need a PS1 memory card. So I apologised to the person who sold me Lemmings and bought a PS1 memory card from eBay which I'm now waiting to be delivered. At the moment Alf is trying out my Need for Speed game.

This week I bought a PS2 game called Canis Canem Edit (aka Bully) from the carboot sale and a PS1 game called Jak and Daxter from a charity shop in town. I've not tried either of them out yet though. I've bought some PS2 games from eBay such as Escape from Monkey Island and Sonic Mega Collection. Escape from Monkey Island has arrived in the post already along with Need For Speed Most Wanted which I bought last week but I've not tried either of them out yet. I'm waiting for Sonic Mega Collection to be delivered. The PS1 games I've bought from eBay are Lemmings and Oh No More Lemmings and Crash Bandicoot 3, which have already arrived though I've not tried out Crash Bandicoot 3 yet, and Croc 1, which I'm waiting for. On Wed eve I decided I'd stop buying PS games from eBay while I tried out the ones I'd got but that didn't even last 24 hours because yesterday evening I couldn't resist buying the PS1 game Spyro Gateway to Glimmer from eBay :P But I checked my bank balance online the other day and it's looking good so I'm ok to buy a few games until the novelty of the PS2 wears off :)

A few days ago the next handheld Nintendo console (which will come after the DS series) was announced. The current name for it is 3DS, but I'm sure that'll change before it's launched. It will incorporate 3D without the user needing to wear special 3D glasses. You can read more about it here. I think it sounds quite exciting.

I've only watched one film since my last update which was called Fish Tank. It wasn't a cheerful film, but was very well made and acted and definitely thought-provoking. I'd recommend it if you want a gritty realistic film that makes you think. On the DVD was also a short film called Wasp that had been the inspiration for Fish Tank so I watched that too.

Since my last update I've discovered the BBC series Outnumbered as I rented the first series on DVD from Tesco DVD rental. I'd seen odd parts of the special episodes for Comic Relief and Sports Relief before so wanted to see more. This week I've watched all 6 episodes of series 1 (plus the cast interviews on the DVD) and I love it :D The first disc of the second series arrived this morning from rental and the second disc is in the post to me, so I'm looking forward to watching series 2 before series 3 starts a week tomorrow. This week I've also begun rewatching series 2 of Ashes to Ashes in preparation series 3 starting on TV next Fri. So far I've rewatched the first 3 episodes of series 2. I can't wait for series 3 :D You can see the BBC trailer here.

I seem to have watched quite a lot on TV, from the hard disc recorder and on online TV catch up services since my last update. I watched the last episode in the current series (and the last ever with Jonathan Ross of Film 2010, 2 episodes of Tracy Beaker Returns, the latest episode of Married Single Other which was very sad (the first 3 episodes were light-hearted and funny, but the next 2 episodes were very moving and a depressing. I wonder how it'll conclude on Mon), a really interesting documentary about refugees from Burma moving to the UK called True Stories: Moving to Mars (I was especially interested in this because Lizzy's husband is from Burma), the first episode in the new series of Children's Hospital, the latest episode of One Born Every Minute, both parts of an interesting BBC programme called Famous Rich and Jobless, 4Music: 4Play: Marina and the Diamonds (It's on the hard disc recorder and I've watched it a few times now), a Neil Sidaka prog with mum, Fri Night with Jonathan Ross featuring Lady Gaga (I thought watching it might help me to understand her but it didn't!), Boyzone Tribute to Stephen Gately (I only watched because I heard Mika had sung on it), Alexandra Burke performing her next single, All Night Long, on Dancing on Ice and Pixie Lott performing her latest single, Gravity, on the Alan Titchmarsh Show. I've now watched everything that I wanted to on the hard disc recorder in preparation for reformatting it, but there are still a few programmes on it that mum wants to watch.

I've had 2 songs stuck in my head a lot since my last update. I got Caravan of Love stuck in head after it was sung on Married Single Other and then again after I heard it on the radio a few days later. I don't mind that song though. More annoying was getting Telephone stuck in my head. Usually when the video comes on the music channels I flick to another channel but I thought I'd watch it through - big mistake! I don't like the song but it's very very catchy! While I was looking for that on Youtube I spotted a link on the side of the page to a Lady Gaga video I was sure I'd not seen before. Although I don't really like Lady Gaga I thought I'd have a look because her videos are always really weird, but to my surprise this one is quite normal!

I'm currently listening to The Family Jewels by Marina and the Diamonds to cheer me up. It's definitely my favourite album at the moment.

Mika was interviewed by Jools Holland on Radio 2 on Mon eve but I missed it on the radio so listened to it on iPlayer last night instead. You can listen to it here but only til Mon (Mika comes in 24 mins into the recording). Mika's latest single Kick Ass (the theme tune to the film of the same title) will be released on Mon and I'll certainly be buying it.

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.

A rough week

Sorry for leaving it so long to update and sorry in advance for the length of this :P If you've not yet read my update about the Mika concert last Sun then you can see it here. I've had quite a rough week with my health this week. I think it's just after the concert on Sun but I've never felt this bad for so long after doing something before, so it's frustrating. I've been more exhausted than usual, my headaches have been more frequent and painful, my legs have been heavier than usual and a bit sore too and my tummy pains have been more severe and rather than coming and going like they usually do I had them for about 3 days without a break earlier in the week. Sorry if this is too much information, but The Pill I'm on usually means I don't have periods but for some reason I've had a heavy one this week. So I'm not sure what symptoms are related to that. I'm also still very nocturnal. Luckily I've not had to cancel many plans but I don't think that going out most days this week has helped my health. I've mostly managed to keep my spirits up despite this but did feel very down last night after I was too unwell to make it out to the second meeting of the teenage discussion group in the village. But I soon felt better after speaking to some lovely friends on the Internet and watching a Mika DVD :)

Since mid-week my hands have been really dry and quite sore around my knuckles. I've had this before but I can't work out what causes it. I've wondered if it's triggered by some soaps I'm not used to and this time it seemed to come on after I'd been out and that day I did wash my hands in some public toilets, but I'm not sure.

On Tue I weighed myself as usual and found I'd put on 0.8kg :) Generally I'm finding eating more manageable at the moment but sometimes I still struggle with meals. My dietician was very impressed with my weight, but said to continue with the high calorie puddings for now. I don't really want to put on any more weight though. She wont be able to make the joint clinic next Wed, which is disappointing as she seems to be the one who has listened to me most about my tummy pains and understands how much trouble they're causing me, so I'd hoped that she'd be able to get my consultants to take me seriously. My dietician isn't worried about having to miss the clinic though because my eating and weight is on track. I'm quite nervous about the clinic next week because from past experience I'm not expecting to make any progress with my tummy pains. But we'll see. Mum is taking me to the clinic and dad might be coming too but wont know til Mon whether he can get the day off work or not.

This week I also emailed the psychologist from Hosp B. I saw her last Nov to start CBT in the hope that it would help my ME. She said we'd continue the work via email but would plan more appts too. I emailed her after the last appt in Nov to try to arrange a follow up appt and then again in Dec with some CBT homework she'd asked me to do, but I didn't receive any replies. So I emailed her again this week to see if she's still happy to do CBT with me. If I don't hear by next Wed I'll mention the lack of contact to my consultants.

On Wed I received a phone call from the physio dept at Hosp H, they said that they'd received a referral letter from Hosp A. The lady I spoke to asked me to join a weekly conditioning class?! I explained that I'd been expecting to see a physio one-to-one so she said she'd find out more and phone me back. I feel seeing a physio one-to-one would potentially be more beneficial for me because that way I would be able to explain about having to be careful not to overdo it etc because of having ME. So hopefully I'll hear back from them soon. I have no idea what the referral from Hosp A to Hosp H will have said and whether it will even have mentioned that I have ME! I'll also mention the physio problems at the joint clinic.

On Thur 4th it would have been Codie's 5th birthday if she was still alive. You can read a post I made in her memory here and see a photo here.

Since I was very young I've been a member of an organisation called PINNT which stands for Patients on Intravenous and Naso gastric Nutrition Therapy who support people who have to be fed either parentally (IV) or enterally. They've been a great support to me and my family over the years. We've been to some of their national and local meet-ups in the past and they now regularly hold regional meet-ups at Hosp A. We keep getting letters about them and keep ignoring them because mum and dad don't want to go. But because PINNT have given me so much support over the years I don't just want to abandon them now I'm off feeds (although mum and dad seem to be happy to do that). So I've persuaded my parents that we should attend the next PINNT regional meeting in April just to let them know how well I'm doing and say thanks for their help before leaving PINNT soon.

As I mentioned earlier I probably should have spent this week resting after the Mika concert but that's never going to happen with me! :P So I've actually had quite a busy week. On Mon morning I did some errands with mum. I accompanied her to the library where she cleaned but because our home Internet was down at this point I used the Internet at the library instead. Then I helped mum with a Tesco shop where I bought some liquorish for Alf's birthday and between us we bought a book for Lizzy's birthday to go with the things we'd already bought her. And then we called in at the cinema where we pre-booked tickets for me, mum, dad and Claire to see Alice In Wonderland 3D on Mon. We couldn't do it over the phone because I had my CEA cinema card. That evening I parcelled up Lizzy's presents (a novel, a book about baked beans and a phone sock), helped mum sort out some library stuff on the computer and wrote a letter to my AYME buddy Kate. And that night I had a very funny conversation with dad when I was in the bathroom brushing my teeth and he woke up and got up to use the toilet. He thought he'd been asleep for hours but in fact he'd only fallen asleep 5 or 10mins ago. And he didn't realise he was half asleep so tried to hold a conversation with me, which was very funny! :P

On Tue I didn't do much, but I did wrap Alf and mum's birthday presents and went round to the post office to post off Lizzy's parcel (for her birthday on Thur) and Kate's letter.

On Wed me and mum did my Tac bloods at home in the morning before I took my Tac and then went into town where mum met up with a fellow knitter for drinks. I wandered round the shops but didn't buy anything. I borrowed a DVD called Sunshine Cleaning from the library though which I'm looking forward to watching :) Then on the way back from town we went to Hosp H for the remainder of my blood tests. There was a different phleb there than usual and she didn't know what to do when I presented her with a bloods letter from Hosp B. So she phoned the more experienced phleb to ask her advice, but as soon as she realised it was me she said that she'd come and take my bloods as sometimes other phlebs struggle. My bloods went fine first attempt :) And I was given the number of the lab at the hosp so next time I need bloods doing I have to ring up an hour or two in advance and check with the lab that the more experienced phleb is in. And then I'll go to the lab instead of the outpatient blood test area so she can do my bloods :) On the way home we called in at the surgery to collect some of my tablets and I went to the post office to send off the Tac blood. Hosp B have redesigned the packaging for it making the whole parcel lighter and cheaper to send :)

Wed was Alf's 17th birthday, so that evening after he got back from college Chris and Sophie came round to join us for a birthday meal for Alf. I thought I wouldn't be well enough to participate in it but I was :) He opened his presents before tea and seemed pleased with them. Then we all enjoyed a nice meal - steak for dad, Alf, Chris and Sophie and quorn burgers for me and mum - we're not veggie but just aren't keen on steak which Alf had chosen to have for his birthday. After tea we all chatted for a bit and me and mum were surprised to hear that Sophie is going to become a Samaritan. We were a bit puzzled by that because we can't even hold a conversation with her (she's lovely just not very easy to talk to), so can't imagine her being a Samaritan. But she's passed the interview so will go on a training course this summer. We'll see. Alf went into town that night to meet up with his friends, but rather than staying out all night he came home early because his friends weren't around. So he's gone out tonight instead.

On Thur morning I had to get up at 8.30am (eek!) because I had an orthodontist appt in the city at Hosp A. On the way there I text Lizzy to wish her happy birthday :) My orthodontist was slightly nicer than usual but I suspect that might be because he was aware that they were asking patients to fill in surveys about their experiences. I was very honest in mine, so thank goodness they were anonymous! He didn't give me much time though and gave me some information that was different from what he said last time I saw him so now I have no idea how much longer I'll need braces for. Grrr. He was pleased with my progress though and I've got another appt for 6 weeks time. And he didn't tighten my wires so my mouth isn't sore :) There was someone else in the room though and they weren't introduced to me, so I have no idea who they were!

After my orthodontist appt me and mum went into the city on the bus. At the weekend a friend had given me a code to get some free photo prints from Jessops online, so I decided to use that to get prints of some photos from Florida, Japan and my sixth form May Ball. The code only worked twice which I wasn't expecting, so I ended up using another code that I'd received when I'd signed up with Jessops online and paying some money too. But it worked out well - I think I got 190 photos printed for less than £6 :D You could pay for delivery or have them delivered to a local store for free, so I had mine delivered to Jessops in the city and picked them up on Thur. The Japan photos came out really well but the Florida photos were a bit blurry. And in the city I also helped mum to buy herself a new phone because her 7 year old Nokia 3410 had finally died! She bought the simplest Nokia in the shop but it's a bit different to her 3410 so I've been teaching her how to use it :) Then we had drinks in a cafe before heading home.

Yesterday morn I spoke to Lizzy on the phone which cheered me up. Her and M are going to come round for the day to see us at the end of April if not before :) And I gave her Alf's email address so she can send him an Amazon voucher for his birthday. Yesterday mum ordered herself some birthday presents online - I don't think that's usually the idea! Her reasoning was that she doesn't expect many birthday presents from others, so she's buying herself some instead! :P She bought herself a new phone on Thur and then some DVDs online yesterday.

And I've not been out of the house today. Dad made me laugh this evening though with a display of his non-existent acrobatic skills. Very silly, but funny. And for tea tonight we had a nice family meal (minus Alf who has gone out to meet his friends) for mum's birthday tomorrow. Tomorrow evening dad is taking her out for a meal in the city. He's a bit rubbish at getting organised though, he was very chuffed at himself for getting some money off vouchers for the meal but we just all had a panic when he appeared to have lost them. Luckily they turned up though. And he hadn't thought to book a table but we persuaded him to phone up tonight to check that there will be a table for them and there will be.

The Internet has been playing up recently. We've had a few very small power cuts that only last a second or two, but sometimes they stop the wireless router working for a little while. But on Mon I really couldn't get it working again. It did after a few hours though. And the Internet connection tends to go very slow and sometimes disconnects itself at night when I try to use it.

I thought that the Royal Mail had lost one of the Tesco rental DVDs that I'd posted back as they usually get there within a couple of days. This one got there eventually though but it took a week!

I heard that a BBC website called Blast that I used to use the message boards of a lot and still use now but less often is going to close down because the BBC have decided to focus on quality rather than quantity. I've made some really good friends on Blast but luckily had already found 2 of them outside of Blast. And one of those friends helped me track down another mutual friend outside of Blast a couple of days ago. So now I'm not too worried about Blast closing because I wont lose my friends from it.

Dad fixed my desk lamp last weekend which I was really grateful for. I thought I'd need a new lamp but apparently you can replace the bulbs and dad just happened to have one the right size :)

At Christmas my uncle (dad's brother) said he'd make my mum a huge pair of knitting needles and she received them last week. Mum doesn't like this photo because she doesn't look very good on it, but I've not had chance to take a better one yet and this does show the size of the needles:
I'm currently considering buying this from eBay to go on my wall next to my bed. I love the quote :)

This evening I received an invitation from my friend Lou to her 30th birthday party this summer. I only know the date so far, the other details are still to be confirmed. But Lou doesn't live too far from me so I think I might try to go if I feel up to it. Lou is lovely but it sounds quite daunting because I've never met her before and probably wont know many if any other people at the party and I'm not always very good at being sociable especially with people I don't know well.

The only game I've played on this week is New Super Mario Bros Wii but I got frustrated at it so didn't go on it for long. And I bought myself a new DS game online called Yoshi's Island DS, so I'm looking forward to that being delivered :)

I've listened to a bit of music this week. I listened to Paloma Faith's album on Spotify but that was mum's choice as I'm not very keen on her voice and her music, Owl City's Ocean Eyes album on Spotify but I soon got bored with that, Ellie Goulding's Lights album yet again and some of an album called This Is The Life by an artist called Amy MacDonald who I'd never heard of before but listened to after some friends suggested that I might like her music. I think it might take a few more listens as the songs don't seem particularly memorable after one listen.

I've also watched the music channels quite a bit too. Avril Lavigne is back with the theme song to Alice In Wonderland which you can see here. I'm not very keen though, seems quite a plain song to me. I was very disappointed by the Black Eyed Peas' new song as I loved their last two (I Gotta Feeling and Meet Me Halfway). And there is far too much Justin Bieber on the music channels for my liking, I really don't get why he's so popular! I was interested to see Diana Vickers' new video for her debut single Once, but was a bit disappointed because I really thought the video would be quirkier. The song is growing on me though and gets stuck in my head with each listen :P

On Mon I was happy to see that Starry Eyed by Ellie Goulding had charted at number 4 in the official singles chart and that The Family Jewels by Marina and the Diamonds had charted at number 5 in the official album chart :) And this week Ellie Goulding's album Lights has been selling well on iTunes so hopefully it'll chart well tomorrow.

The only DVD I've watched this week is Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl which I watched with my mum this evening. I'd watched it a long time ago but didn't remember it. I enjoyed it but it was a bit on the long side :P

I've watched lots of TV (live, on Internet catch-up services and on the HDR) this week due to not feeling very well. I skimmed through the Shockwaves NME Awards where Little Boots looked quite different presenting an award, Marina and the Diamonds performed with Biffy Clyro and Lily Allen performed with the Big Pink. I also watched some of the winter olympics where I saw a liver transplant recipient competing, a very good BBC drama series called Five Days, an odd BBC documentary called Why Did You Kill My Dad?, a couple more episodes of Tracy Beaker Returns, two more episodes of the very interesting Syrian School, a rubbish programme about Australia border patrol but I was bored, a BBC documentary about real life stories magazines called Secrets for Sale, another episode of Channel 4's One Born Every Minute, the first 2 episodes of a great new ITV series that I'd highly recommend called Married Single Other, an interesting ITV documentary called Seven Days In Traffic that also mentioned organ donation, Film 2010 which contained a great review of Alice In Wonderland, a Channel 4 documentary about real life stories magazines called My Daughter Grew Another Head and Other True Life Stories, Friday Night with Jonathan Ross which contained an interesting interview with Tim Burton and Johnny Depp, part of an episode of The Bubble, a great BBC documentary called Sue Johnston's Shangri La and I half watched an episode of QI XL. And last night I watched an episode of Embarrassing Bodies because Tori said on her blog that her friend would be on it talking about cystic fibrosis.

I follow lots of blogs and most of them are written by people who have been affected by transplants. 22 year old Rachy keeps a blog that I read regularly here. Last week she attended transplant clinic and was told that her time really is running out and she will die unless she receives a lung transplant in time. You can read her blog post about that clinic here. I know I talk about organ donation a lot but if you are reading this and haven't yet signed up to the organ donor register then please do so. Or if you already have please talk to your family and friends about it. It only takes 2 mins and you can save lives. Click here. Thank you.

Mika concert!

Sorry for not managing to write this update sooner. I've had a rough week since the concert, but it was definitely worth it as I had a fantastic time :D Full update about everything else coming soon, but I thought Sun deserved a post of its own :)

I managed to get 12 hours sleep last Sat night (10.30pm til 10.30am) and woke up feeling much better on Sun than I had on Sat. That morning I listened to Mika's albums in preparation for the concert and also painted my long nails dark purple :)

We had a bit of a muddle trying to find the train times as the times on the Internet weren't the same as those in our paper timetable, so we weren't sure whether the train went at 4.06pm or 4.26pm. So we decided to head for the station in time for the 4.06pm train and if it was the later one we'd just have to wait for a little while. A road on our route to the station was closed due to flooding so we had to take a bit of a detour. We arrived at the station about 4.10pm but luckily the correct train was actually the 4.26pm one so we were in time for that. Mum forgot her rail card though, so our tickets cost £21 each whereas if she had had the card with her they would only have cost £13 each. Mum joked that it was my fault for not reminding her about the card :P We found out that our journey back would be a bit disrupted due to engineering works, but at this point we didn't realise exactly how disrupted... I listened to more Mika on the train and then when we got to Kings Cross we tried to find out more about the engineering works, but no-one really knew what was happening.

We made our way on the tube to Hammersmith station and once there we easily found the venue. It was pouring with rain, but we didn't have to join the queue like those with standing tickets did as we already had allocated seats :) I met the dad of the girl who I was selling my final spare standing ticket to and that went fine.

Then me and mum found a little Lebanese cafe round the corner (wonder if Mika realised it was there - he's half Lebanese) so we went in for drinks and to shelter from the rain. I was in contact with H via text as she was on her way in the car with her parents, sister and brother who would be seeing the concert standing, whereas we had seated tickets. Then we heard that H's parents and sister had forgotten their tickets, but her brother O had his and we had H's. H's parents rang up the venue but there was no way that they'd be able to get in without their tickets and they didn't think they'd be able to get home and back in time for the concert. So they dropped H and O off at a tube station and they made their way across London on their own while the rest of their family went home. H's sister was upset that she wouldn't be able to see the concert so her parents took her to the cinema instead as a distraction.

It was now almost time for the doors of the venue to open and the rain had stopped so we left the cafe. We had to join the long queue to get into the venue but luckily it moved quickly. We entered the venue just as H and O came out of the tube station. They joined the queue and mum nipped back out to give H her ticket. I managed to get to the front of the merchandise stand and bought myself a new Mika t-shirt (it's dark blue with his latest album cover on the front and tour dates on the back) and a pack of 4 button badges (which cost £8!). Then we made our way upstairs and I met up with H in the huge queue for the toilets.

We went in and found our seats. We could see everyone standing downstairs in the stalls. We were in the 4th row of the circle near-ish to the edge. And no-one sat in front of me! :D We saw Mika's dad and brother seated just along from us! Mum nearly went to introduce herself but we weren't sure at that point whether it was them or not. I'm not too bothered that we didn't speak to them though. And we saw Mika's mum and one of his sisters at a previous concert. We also saw an old lady who looked about my Nan's age (probably somewhere in her 80s) dancing along to Mika :)

Because we were a bit late making our way to our seats we only had to listen to the last 3 songs of Erik Hassle's set. After seeing him live for the 2nd time I'm still not a fan. It was then a while til Mika came on so me and H chatted a lot as we'd not seen each other for quite a while. And H popped out to get a drink and to try to buy a Mika t-shirt but there weren't any left in her size.

Then Mika came on stage and he was amazing :D The set was great - there was a huge notebook at the back of the stage which showed different animations for each song. Sometimes it was a bit distracting though and I ended up watching the notebook for one song instead of Mika :P And lots of good props were used too - Mika wore an amazing colourful coat for Doctor John and played with a puppet of him for Toy Boy. Mika had loads of energy. As well as singing and dancing he also played the piano for some parts. And he often held his microphone out to the audience for them to sing a line and even when it wasn't from a chorus everyone knew it. I sang along to it all and had nearly lost my voice by the end of it. And I stood up and danced to some of it, but my legs were quite sore, even when I was sitting down which is unusual for me. The set wasn't all working though - some inflatable props wouldn't inflate, the smoke machine went into overdrive so I See You became I Can't See You, the keyboard stopped working and I think Mika lost the backing tracks at one point too. So this led to lots of swearing, but Mika asked the audience to get more involved to make up for the equipment not working :)

Mika performed 10 out of 12 songs from Life In Cartoon Motion (all but Over My Shoulder, which I don't like, and Ring Ring, which I like) and 9 songs from The Boy Who Knew Too Much (all but By The Time & Pick Up Off The Floor, which I don't like, One Foot Boy, which I like, and Loverboy/Lady Jane). The finale was his 2 most popular songs, Grace Kelly and Lollipop, and involved huge balloons, glitter and streamers coming out into the audience :D We all really really enjoyed it :D Sorry I didn't take any photos, we were quite far away from the stage and I prefer to enjoy the concert in the moment rather than worry about taking photos.

Afterwards we met up with O who had been standing and all headed back to Kings Cross together on the tube. When we were on the tube a woman who was standing was going to faint so I let her have my seat. She'd seen Mika too. We just missed a train at Kings Cross. H and O left us and headed home on their train. We then tried to find out what was happening with our journey home and the engineering works on our line and the man we spoke to told us that we wouldn't be able to get home! We had heard that coaches were replacing the train between 2 stops due to engineering works, so at 11.30pm we caught a train to the first of those stops hoping that we'd find a coach there. Along with a group of other people we ended up standing in a freezing cold car park at 12.30am waiting for a coach. Mum spoke to one of the other coach drivers there who let us all sit on his coach (which was going somewhere else) to keep warm. Here's a photo that I took of mum on that coach:
After a while that coach had to go so we had to stand back in the car park again. I watched rabbits hopping around the car park while we waited, but mum was winding me up by saying I was imagining things. Then she saw the rabbits so I made her apologise to me for doubting me :P

At about 1am our coach arrived and we got on it. We thought we'd be getting back on the train in a couple of stops time, but more of the line had been closed than we expected so the coach would actually take us to our local station. The coach driver wasn't allowed to leave til 1.20am though. There was a great atmosphere on the coach as the people were lovely as was the coach driver and we had lots of laughs together. Here's a photo I took of mum and the coach driver while we were waiting to set off (sorry for the bad quality, my phone camera doesn't cope very well with poor lighting conditions):
Someone who was going to the stop after ours asked for an estimated time of arrival and was told 3.20am! The journey that was estimated to take 2 hours on the coach would take 30mins on the train! On the journey we went via lots of other stops so I listened to Ellie Goulding and Pixie Lott on my iPod. Me and mum accidentally woke the man in front of us up at the wrong stop (we thought it was his but it wasn't), whoops! Luckily we ran a bit ahead of time so were dropped off at our local station at about 2.30am. We picked up the car and headed home, but on the way we discovered more flooded roads so had to take a long detour. And we passed the coach again at it's next stop :P We got home at 3am. The journey home from Kings Cross would usually have taken one hour, but that night it took 3 and a half hours!

One of my friends with ME saw Mika at a different venue last week and she got to meet him. I'm very happy for her but a bit jealous too as I'd love to meet him. Hopefully I will some day.