5 down, 1 to go...

OK, so as I write it’s technically only 4 and a half down, 1 and a half to go, but that isn’t as catchy. Yes, the chemo process (this round, at least) is starting to hear the fat lady warm up her vocal chords.

It’ll be sometime in March before I know whether there’s a follow-up round of chemo, but the way things look to be working out I might get a break from it a little longer than normal. Not building my hopes up, but we’ll see.

Perhaps the strangest thing about this whole process is that you have no idea whether or not it is actually working. While I have a couple of external lumps that could act as indicators for progress that seem to be shrinking slightly, that’s by no means a reliable test when the real stuff that the progress is needed on is inside me.

Having not really been well for months before my latest diagnosis I don’t have any feeling of being unwell with the cancer to relate how I feel now to. Over the last month or six weeks I’ve felt better than I have since before I went into hospital last June, and between then and starting the chemo, all I was doing was trying to recover from operations.

So at some point in March, I’ll hop (or possibly use a less sprightly movement) onto a CT scan bed and start ten days or so waiting for the result, having no idea at all as to whether the news will be good or not quite as good. ‘Wait and see’ has been a phrase by which I seem to have lived my life a lot over the last year, and it will come into play again.

So far I can’t complain about how I’ve done with the chemo side effects. There’s little bits and bobs now that can be attributed to it, but some of them (the really annoying ulcer you get on the end of your tongue, a few spots, dry skin) are all things that are pretty day to day anyway. The only thing out of the ordinary is a Gorbachev-style mark on my neck – although I really must get round to checking that I’ve washed there lately, thinking about it…

At least I am able to get out and about and do things that a few months back wouldn’t have been possible. I’ve managed to get away this last weekend to catch up with some friends and the start of the rugby season, which has been great. Less drinking than similar weekends in the past maybe, but that’s a price worth putting up with.

Yes, it was down to Cardiff for Millennium Magic weekend to watch the start of the Super League season, staying with friends down near Bristol, which allowed for a bit of culture that those of you who usually switch off when the sport bit kicks on might be interested in.

Although I didn’t spend too long at the ground, only seeing the Leeds game and a bit of 2 others, my overall impression was that it was a successful event worth repeating again – in advance I expected it to be a pretty poor spectacle that would get ditched after this year. The event is never going to sell out a ground that size, and that shouldn’t be the target, but it does seem a shame that anybody local going along just out of interest not only a) has to pay far more than Super League season ticket holders but b) if they find themselves hooked by what they’ve seen, having so far to travel to see another game.

Obviously from a Leeds point of view, it was good to see the season start with a win. It was extremely sweet that that win came with such a dramatic late flourish and in the manner it did – laughing at the Bulls last minute Cardiff heartbreak once again. And how ironic that our ‘get out of jail’ card was handed to us by Gareth Raynor, a player who knows plenty about that subject…

It was very encouraging to see some flashes of brilliance from Rob Burrow, who is perhaps due a big season. Ten years on from his Leeds debut, maybe he can thrive with the extra early season responsibility he will shoulder in the absence of Danny McGuire.

Less encouraging, and to be returned to in a future piece, were the pink boots of Brent Webb and Ryan Hall, together with their pink and blue socks. Just not right.

And an unexpected bonus while our winning penalty try was being considered – a new piece of video ref music! After years of the same predictable music whenever the ‘square in the air’ is drawn our winning score was considered with the backdrop of Ian Brown’s Stellify. Well done to whoever came up with that – more where that came from please!

Finally on rugby league, well done to Wakefield on getting their new owners. Anybody reckon this will be any different, though, to the time their benefactors signed players like Steve McNamara (back in the days when he was a good player, rather than just a poor choice as national coach) only to find that actually his big cheque was just the wrapper off a tin of Tesco Value Peach Halves? No, me neither.

Sporting action for me this weekend will be the Track Cycling World Cup in Manchester. Well worth a watch on your BBC red button all this weekend.

Milestones

Plenty of milestones passed this week. I’m now well over halfway through the initial chemo process, with 4 of the 6 cycles over and done with.

And I’ve managed to make plenty of other progress over the last week, with a real sense of ‘returning to normal’ (no sniggering at the back) at last.

After what seems like a ridiculous length of time off, I’ve finally managed to get back to work. I’m only working part-time to start off with and phasing myself back in gradually, but a start is a start. Walking back into work on Monday morning felt very strange – I was going to say a cross between your first day at school, and walking to the executioners chair. But one of those I can’t remember, and the other I’ve clearly never experienced. And it’s doubtful anybody ever caught the number 73 bus partway to the executioners chair so as not to wear themselves out.

So that’s two milestones. I’ve passed two more as well – one as a direct result of the other, the Milestone being my local pub (although I’m sure they prefer ‘one of Ramsay’s Best Restaurants’ rather than ‘local pub’ as a descriptor) and having walked past it numerous times since moving back to my flat part-time. Yep, finally capable of living on my own again…!

So back to work, back to my own flat, and capable of holding down a bit of a social life again. Not the worst of weeks really.

Moving on, a bumper extra bit of sport for you this week. I realise this is where some of you switch off and lose interest – sorry and all that. But be warned – one week I’ll throw some non-sport stuff in later on. And there’ll be a test on it the week after.

But yes, back to the sports stuff, and the return of Super League. I’ll be down at Cardiff this weekend for the dreadful shirt parade as all 7 fixtures take place at the Millennium Stadium. It should be a good spectacle, and provide an interesting and unique start to the year.

I’ll be honest – I’m only bothered about seeing Leeds v Bradford this weekend, the derby formerly known as the biggest game in rugby league. It’s given us a genuine magic moment in the past with our dramatic late victory in 2007 and has been good to Leeds with 4 wins from 4 weekends so far. I wish I was confident that record will extend, but I see this as the first game of a transitional season for Leeds. A new coach, key players out for the start of the season, and new signings that don’t look like setting the league alight. Saving grace for Leeds this weekend may be that Bradford are going through more upheaval – they can’t be worse than they have been recently though, and could be a surprise package come the play-offs. Hopefully they won’t settle down too early…

Wigan must be favourites to defend the title they won last year, and I expect Warrington to run them closest. But I’ve a feeling those two could have a season a decent bit clear of the rest of the pack – Saints, ourselves and Huddersfield closest to getting on terms for me.

There’s new grounds to visit for Super League fans this season. St Helens pitch up at their new ground at last – oh no sorry, they’re squatting at Widnes for the year. Well, it helped break Wigan’s trophy drought, so you can’t blame them for trying. Then there’s Castleford at their new place, the Probiz Coliseum, and Wakefield – should they bother starting the season – now at the Rapid Solicitors Stadium. Although I have heard a nasty rumour that neither is a new ground and they are just the same shoddy heaps that last saw money spent on them around the same time British Coal were still opening new pits...

Some final things for my Super League preview. New signings to watch out for this season – Luke O’Donnell at Huddersfield, a State of Origin bruiser probably best described as no-nonsense, and Ryan Hoffman at Wigan, who could easily be the best signing this close season.

Two hopes for the season – firstly, that there is less focus on referees. They all make mistakes, they will all continue to. Let’s take the focus off the officials and accept that there aren’t any better out there. And however many mistakes they are making, your/our team and coaching staff are making just as many. Let’s just get on with enjoying the game. Second (no doubt pie in the sky) hope is that the increasing trend towards supporters claiming to ‘hate’ other teams starts to reverse. There will always be room for traditional rivalries, but the shitty, seeming need amongst some supporters, to hate everybody else is unnecessary and shouldn’t have any place in the game. More chance of Amos Roberts winning Man of Steel but still…

I wasn’t going to mention anything else sports wise but I can’t not make mention of returned dope cheat (it’s OK Wigan fans, we’ve moved on from RL, it’s not Gareth Hock) Riccardo Ricco and his self administered blood transfusion. A great way to try and kill yourself, albeit one that ends up only killing your career and proving why life bans should be in place for dope cheats. Complete tool, although given the frightening parallels with an earlier Italian cyclist, I struggle to reconcile my hatred for how Ricco has treated the sport with my continued admiration for Marco Pantani as a cyclist.

Trying to predict side effects could send you barking mad...

Quite a lot of people that know me will know that I don’t like dogs. It’s an entirely rational dislike – some dog apparently put me in hospital while I was on holiday once. I was too young to remember that at all, but it makes it a rational dislike…

Ever since I’ve preferred to keep my distance from dogs, and whilst there’s a few of my friends’ pets’ I’ve got used to, by and large I still don’t like them. This includes dogs you encounter in the park who jump up at you while their owners bleat that ‘it won’t bite’. Well, to start off with, just because your dog ‘won’t bite’ (yeah, like you know it won’t…) doesn’t mean I suddenly want it jumping all over me. On one level I don’t expect people to understand, you can’t see my stitches and op wounds at dog-paw-jumping height; on another level that certain social failure dog owners fail to understand, I don’t want to have to put my jeans in the wash when I get home because you’re incapable of/can’t be arsed to control your mutt.

There is a point I’m getting to here. I’ve always been told dogs make a beeline for me because they can ‘smell my fear’ (uni lads – please read in Partridge-esque tone). Yesterdays papers suggest otherwise. Apparently dogs can smell if you’ve got bowel cancer! Now, I’m quite prepare to put my dislike of dogs to one side for a minute and say that that is one clever dog – either that or it’s a dog it’d be worth getting to pick your lottery numbers.

Anyway, it brings into question that ‘smell your fear’ lark. All this time I’ve been having a go at those damn dogs, when all they were trying to do is give me an early warning!!!

I don’t mean to scare you if you’ve noticed a dog spending rather too long sniffing your leg earlier on today by the way. There’s more chance of you having stood still too long and it having been a blind dog looking for a lamppost to piss against…

Moving on from dogs, it’s not long til the new Super League season – look out for my assessment of Warrington’s new centre/winger next week…

My chemo side effects continue to be as random as a Rowntree’s Randoms advert. There seems to be no pattern at all now, with the last few days of the latest two-week cycle being by far the worse of the last few cycles.

Today has seen cycle 4 start – into the second half of the initial programme, which is one landmark reached and passed. And whereas two weeks ago I just wanted to sleep on ‘day one’ and came home from hospital capable of doing nowt more than lazing on the sofa watching crap on the telly, today I’m feeling fine and up to knocking out this literary masterpiece.

You may have noticed that cricket, and, this midweek, football as well, have been noticeably absent from any comment in the blog. Space restraints. Sorry. Sure you understand.

Just one final thing. If anybody from the UCI is reading, regarding Alberto Contador. Drugs cheat = 2 year ban. Just sort it, OK?

Until next time…