Images of London in one go - the Tower and a real London bus with a platform at the back.

Wednesday to Friday: I went to London - met Aidan by the Tower and stayed over with him. Then visited Helen; we went on the river back from the Tate Modern (food and drink - not art) to the new pier at Vauxhall. Then to Covent Garden (old stamping ground) on Friday - more eating and drinking.

I was aware of it being much harder to breath - so I walked around quite slowly but still got too tired for comfort. I have the first chemo appointment booked in for Tuesday next week, with a blood test the day before - so I become medicalised again - better than the alternative but it makes me feel gloomy. There are weekly infusions (and blood tests) for three weeks and then a week without one - called a 'rest'!

I am not coping well with this - I feel too gloomy, breathless and tired to do so. But I am intending to go to geology as usual on Monday and to host a meeting here about the U3A web site on Tuesday. I am also trying to catch up with the general admin of life and writing to people.

11-50 hrs: got up feeling a bit depressed - an hour in the gym was good and am now trying to catch up with domestic admin, dealing with U3A website and putting books on shelves. (Yes - they are still on the floor).

eve: The rest of the day - lots of minor things -domestic admin,  cycled to the boat (put on the genoa), back via the shops and more domestic triva alongside watching tele.

Week in Woodbridge 3

a.m. Not sure how to spend the day - sunshine forecast so am temped by the beach. In the end - decide I need to recoup strength, so go to the gym and plan to do useful things in the sun. The gym - a life-saver and an important part of my life here; I try to go every other day. I do a varied routine of resistance training using free weights which normally takes about an hour to an hour and a quarter. At the moment I am gradually increasing the range of what I do and the weights I use, so it also confirms my general well-being or otherwise.

But some unease inside - two years ago I ran away to sea but only got as far as Woodbridge. I did intend to go much further and have to be careful not to rage that it has not been possible. Why not rage? - good question - I feel that I have landed up somewhere with a better lifestyle than I had before - interesting sailing, different boats and two bathrooms - so I would not be respecting my life if I did too much weeping and gnashing of teeth. But - - - -

21-30: I have spent the whole day doing various small things - mostly in the sun - and (probably) avoiding doing some writing. It is often thus. All the trivia - including putting out the rubbish, mending a sail, looking at boats,cooking a batch of fish pies, buying things and gossiping to various people about all sorts of things like how to make vegetable stock out of broad bean and pea shells. But I did put in two hours on the U3A web site updating a lot of articles about interest groups.

Week in Woodbridge 1

From Bawdsey beach - looking upstream across the Deben to Felixstow Ferry;
sea kale in flower in the foreground

20-50 hrs: I do not expect this week to be typical - for one thing there is more wind and sun forecast than usual. And I plan to do more sailing things than usual.

Monday - to the gym (geology group not meeting today) and then packed a load of beach-survival-things to go to the beach to look at the waves and gravel. But a lot of fussing around the flat - clearing the gear from being on rescue yesterday, filing papers, answering a couple of emails. I make it out eventually and go to the shops on the way  to Bawdsey Quay, (about 8 miles away) where I park the car overlooking the river - eat - drink coffee - watch the waves - usual things. Both an early and a late lunch.

Eventually walked out to the beach along the footpath - put on a lot of clothes due to strong and cold wind. The waves in the river almost show in the picture. Took pictures of sea kale, gravel, waves and a few plants. Collected two kilo of gravel for an experiment (of which more later - but probably unsuccessful). Returned to the car and grossed out in the tea room. Then back to Woodbridge. 

Nothing much since apart from eating a small supper (due to a lot of eating during the day) and doing some editing on the U3A website - it needs to be done asap.

15-40 hours: This is a reconstruction of  Rhynia gwynne-vaughanii - one of the most common plants in the Rhynie ecosystem (about 400 million years ago).

I have no idea why I have not posted something for so long. It is not that I have been doing lots of significant things. But after New Year various things have turned up - like going to Ipswich hospital for an Xray (taking an hour or so - hardly a reason for not writing). A combination of getting yet more stuff out of my boat, scrubbing the bottom of boats at the sailing club, sanding my rudder in the bath, trying to write documentation, trying to 'do' plant fossils, having visitors and doing the normal things of life. 

The reconstruction is of  Rhynia gwynne-vaughanii - a member of an extinct group of primitive plants called the rhyniophytes, characterised by simple branching and naked stems.  But why is this here? - I have been torturing the brain trying to understand things about plant evolution- for the U3A geology group. We have now reached the Devonian. There are some cherts (from the village of Rhynie in north east Scotland, about 50km north west of Aberdeen) with a whole ecosystem preserved in detail in the chert. And I am unfamiliar with all the concepts and all the vocabulary - - .

The tides are up in the middle of the day - so sailing if weather OK

20-20 hrs: Today - sunshine - a down river sail with a good, if gusty, wind, but returning for a late lunch due to tides. Tired for the rest of the day. This is the Deben downstream from Woodbridge. I normally go down river at least to the Rocks. At high water - it is all blue; the yellow bits are muddy mud, deep enough to sail over at high tide.

This follows on from an interesting week. U3A geology group, work on U3A web site, pruned a large bush outside the sailing club, had lunch with Aidan and watched too much TV in the evenings because I had got tired doing things all day, but not cuts -TV.

Doing things- good - due to new wonder-drug.

update

17-50 hrs: Rodinia broke up over 500 million years ago. 
I was right - rodinia and pre cambrian Scotland has kept me out of mishief this week - and distracted me from clearing up the mess in my house. Also a useful distraction from the main side effect of Tarceva - a rash on my face which I need to leave alone and not scratch! I think it is working - I feel OK - and not breathless. A bit lazy - but that is a side-effect of life.

Rodinia - a pre Cambrian continent

12-00 hrs: Let myself in for preparing a session for the U3A geology group on pre-cambrian rocks. This is the first continental mass (that is known about) - 750 million years ago. Scotland is attached to Canada - marked SC on the turqiose bit between the yellow (the core of ancestral Europe)  and dark blue (Gonwanaland) masses. 

 I think I am going to be beating my brain with this for the rest of the week - keeps me out of mischief I suppose - and also shows that I continue to improve.

lookfar's third cruise - -

17-10 hrs: still too busy to take pictures - but Aidan may have one.

This time we went out and came back on one tide. What I really want to say is that we sailed downstream and back -  and just got in on the falling tide - hit the rudder on the sill but not the keel. I am probably going to get a new engine - the old one does not work to my satisfaction - cuts out at low revs.

Today - AGM of U3A - and I am now on the committee to represent the web team - sigh -  I think is the right response.

Geology trip to Walton on the Naze

18-20 hrs: The geology group of the U3A in East Suffolk took itself off to Walton on the Naze to inspect cliff erosion, a wave-cut platform and lots of fossils.

This was hugely enjoyable - and I had no idea that Walton beach was such a rich source of geological examples of various kinds. 

There is London clay at the foot of the cliff - which yields fossil wood and teeth - and much else if you know what to look for. Above the clay - there are levels of sand with a lot of coral and shells. The upper layers slump down onto the beach, as the picture shows. There are no signs of attempts to protect the cliffs here - which seems strange but at least leaves good features for us to ponder.

Tomatoes

19-50 hrs: This window sill is supposed to get hot and sunny - thus the tomatoes. The plants are bred for captivity in pots and hanging baskets - and the fruit are the baby variety. I do wonder if the flowers (of which there are a lot) will ever set.

The weather has been cold and windy, so have taken the opportunity to do useful things around the house, to do useful things around the boat, to learn useful things about the U3A web site and wait until the sun shines, in anticipation of which I have bought a very large sun hat.

more on the U3Aes web site

13-30 hrs: No picture - this topic does not lend itself to illustrations.

I have spent much of yesterday and today working on understanding the U3A web site. I have even written a planning document and lots of emails to various interested people. Be impressed - but the sun is now out and I am off to see that lookfar is happy.

University of the Third Age

16-50 hrs: I have spent most of today involved with the U3A - and quite a lot of time lately reading up on the technology of their new web site at  http://www.u3aeastsuffolk.org.uk/ It will not surprise you to know that I volunteered to be their systems admin person - taking over from a member who is moving. The job appears to involve a combination of content management, user support and technical work - just like the University Computing Service (recently ISS) in Newcastle University. It uses Joomla (interesting) and will include a committee meeting once a month (stressful).

In the morning - went to the geology group and looked at the shapes of crystals and some specimins of minerals - as well as planning a morning (next Monday) on the beach under Walton-on-the-Naze looking at mud, fossils and rocks - mostly mud I fear. Afternoon - my first U3A committee meeting - - - .

U3A - geology and a cool website

18-10: My only remaining fossil; the rest have been lost in the move - along with boxes of rocks. A very old interest which I thought I would never come back to - - but things change.

So the relevance of this is - - that I have joined a geology group of the University of the Third Age. I met the group for the first time this morning but have spent time reading the text book and browsing various web sites about local geology.

And how about this as the coolest web site showing animations of plate tectonics and changing continents. The north Atlantic one is good - lots more stuff on this site.