Keeping it Normal

As part of my whole "carry on as normal" thing I decided to go up to Cardiff for the afternoon on Wednesday to see the Welsh Judo guys, and as luck would have it I awoke hangover and headache free. I was almost disappointed! I haven't had a single headache since surgery and thought I might have earned one in 'spoons. On the up side it meant I was in a fit state to get out of bed and into 'diff at a reasonable time.

My time until my appointment Friday is basically consisting of trying to find ways to exist without intense boredom, so a bit of time away from the house was all sorts of welcome. I got dropped at Sport Wales and met up with what remains of the Welsh Judo Full Time Setup, before heading into town for a Costa and Nandos. My week took a significant turn for the worse however when Nandos in Brewery 1/4 were out of creamy mash. Spicy rice just isn't the same.

Being in Cardiff also gave me an opportunity to buy myself a wooly hat (see terrible photo below) in preparation for the upcoming radiation-induced baldness. Unfortunately I can't pull off any sort of wooly hat so I have basically just spent £20 on a way to look a bit silly. Although, thinking about it I've had nights out where I've spent much more than that and looked a lot sillier, and at least this time I have something to show for it in the morning... Silver linings.

Having had a productive day of hat buying and chicken eating I headed back to Maesteg with the brother for the next phase of Operation: Carry On As Normal. The gym. I'd only trained once since all of this began so was pretty excited to have a full chest session with the blessing of my consultant. I did however have to reassure the gym owner that the chances of me dropping dead in the gym were no greater than usual and that my entry wound in my skull was equally unlikely to burst open during a tough set.

Classing that session as successful (I even woke up today with something resembling chest DOMS) we went back again for back day today. Hopefully I'll be able to keep up the training as much as possible over the coming weeks, because if I'm going to be bald I will at least need to keep some semblance of shape below the neck to make me feel a bit more positive.

I feel I should point out that I'm not vain, but do feel better when I look good.

Okay, maybe I'm a little bit vain, but a bit of pride in your appearance can't be a bad thing surely?

Fine, I'll admit vanity does factor into my life a bit... But at the end of the day I'm going to be looking like a prat with no hair so maybe this will help me on my way to not caring so much about my appearance. It's unlikely though, I'll admit that.

A photo posted by Jamie MacDonald (@thejamiemac) on Jan 22, 2015 at 2:58pm PST