Subheading Chronic

On Sunday I cuddled a SKUNK.

He was absolutely lovely and it's pretty much made my month. I held him, stroked him and gave him tickles.

And only narrowly managed to stop him from chewing the end off my PEG tube.

That would have been a fun phone call to make.

Been going to Martin Mere every weekend for a few months now, which has been absolutely brilliant - the last couple of weeks I've taken my PA's kids with, and having some young folk to share the wonder of the place with has been really lovely. Last weekend we got oinked at by Pig Geese, hand-fed some Nenes, watched a couple of moorhens feeding their brood of six days-old chicks, said hello to the cranes from a safe distance, admired the now enormous black swan cygnets, discussed the intricacies of sexual domination by mallard ducks (!) and saw our first ever Nene gosling - as they are the rarest geese in the world, this is really quite a big deal. Basically, awesome. Many apologies to the kids' parents for turning them into birdwatchers.

Next week we're going to try and go early so that we can go on the Canoe Safari and look for water voles. I'm hugely looking forward to this, having had a go on the accessible boat's twin at WWT Arundel some years ago.

Well, that's the dodgy tum explained then.

Nasty UTI, combined with a few symptoms of something entirely unrelated, threw me off enough that I didn't manage the usual early self-diagnosis: it's been years since I've had one get this bad before treatment. Oh balls. Well, at least the nice out-of-hours GP had the antibiotics in his car, so I could take my first dose approximately ten minutes after diagnosis.

I really ought to be grateful that I'd forgotten how ill a bad UTI can make you feel, rather than just whinging that I feel like absolute shit. A few years ago I was spending what added up to roughly a couple of months a year feeling like this.

The lovely Student Support people at the OU managed to get me my textbooks posted out early, which is completely brilliant as it's meaning that I can get ahead on the reading when I can, and build up a nice big cushion by the time the course actually starts in May. Ought to be good insurance against one bad-impairment week knocking everything horribly off-kilter.

As an aside, I really do like distance learning. I dismissed it some years ago as a non-option for someone who works (or fails to work) like I do - distractibility, procrastination, complete absence of organisation skills - but actually, the courses are SO well put-together that I can just rattle along pre-laid tracks. I think it's actually improved my study skills a bit, but in any case I don't really need any particularly - you just do as you're told, in your own home, in your own time - which eliminates almost all the access problems I had at a bricks-and-mortar university in one swoop. It doesn't matter that getting to a lecture before 2pm is near impossible, because the lectures are recordings and I can play them at 5am while tickling Figgykitten's tummy, if that's what suits me.

Going to try and do some more sleeping now. Still need to sort my sleep hygiene out properly, but probably not while exhausted just by being poorly.

Having a dicky tummy and relying on a hoist to move from A to B is a really very bad combination. Just saying.

Being reliant for critical comfort-related care on district nurses who have effectively given themselves a THREE HOUR window to turn up in (in the middle of the night) isn't great either.

I've discovered rice again as a relatively safe soft food: overcooked slightly, made wetter and squishier with a little bit of marge and some grated cheese.

Quavers are also apparently quite safe as they dissolve in your mouth and don't leave you with solid bits to choke on. I'm not so sure about this, but I do love Quavers.

So, Facebook have finally forcibly 'upgraded' me to Timeline. That marks the end of my five years as a regular user, then. Bastards.

A quick census, of sorts: who's reading this? Please let me know by any convenient and accessible method - comment, email, whatever.

There's a purry kitten curled up against my tummy. He looks very happy.

I don't mean Prostate Specific Antigen...

A nurse-inspired Public Service Announcement: I am a person on the autistic spectrum. One who interacts reasonably comfortably with others, and with a good palette of coping strategies, but nonetheless: autistic. Fundamentally, unchangeably, unapologetically. You know this.

If you agree something with me, and then change your mind and pursue those changed plans without actually telling me and giving me some time to think about it, I Will. Not. Cope. I will be confused, anxious and defensive. I'll probably feel angry with you for making me feel like this. I will not be able to absorb your new plan, and I will not be able to follow it. I don't like feeling like this and I'm reasonably sure you don't like the aftermath... so DON'T DO IT TO ME.

And doing this when you've had a full 24 hours to send a two-line email, even a text message to let me know? Not cool.

In other news, I have shingles, which sucks deeply.

It's time to get serious. The going is now quite definitively tough, and so it's time to get going.

The Disabled People's Direct Action Network (DAN) is on the move again. Join us - at the above link, and on Facebook.

Disabled People FIGHT BACK.

Has been found dead in a Bangkok hotel.

BBC reckons suicide.

Sounds like breathplay-gone-wrong to me.

Either way, very sad.

You know you're a true adult when you take an old friend to the vet, sign the forms, sit and hold him and wait for the purring to stop... and then drive home. Alone.

I seem to have mislaid my sunglasses; red frames, dark brown lenses in a white glasses case. Did any of the many delightful HL past and present ladies pick them up by accident, by any chance? am a muppet and found them in my laptop bag some time later.

In other news: Piccadilly Circus queue party, yay. Deathly Hallows, also yay. And ooh. And many other things besides which I shall not discuss lest someone be unwise enough to read LJ while hoping not to be spoilered.