Dear “Alien”,

At the risk of bad karma by gloating I’ve got to say you must be feeling pretty disappointed recently.  First that phone call from my lovely Consultant telling me that as the tumour on my liver is pretty titchy still its been decided that the best course of action isn’t palliative chemo (phew – it’s worth having my hair cut and coloured then) and it isn’t RFA (phew – lightly grilled liver and bacon can reappear on my menu option radar for a while longer) it is in fact … nothing!  Yep, at the time of writing this you are so small and insignificant we’re just ignoring you unless you decide to up your game before my next scan.

Just before I had the phone call I’d already decided on an impromptu visit to my family in the Midlands over the Easter weekend and for a maximum sense of well being spending time with your family age ranging from 83 to 2 is thoroughly recommended.  If you can throw in the fact that you can tell them the good news about treatment or lack of it it’s even better.  If, after months of not really eating much you can polish off  the best chips in the world, lasagne, roast lamb dinner including pud  and, the most wonderful imaginary strawberry cupcake then it really doesn’t get much better.  OK I’m still off booze and I still get tired and I sometimes get stomach cramps that make me a little less chatty for a sec and I’ll grant you, Alien, there were some moments that were bitter sweet and stung my eyes a little bit but nevertheless it must have sucked to be you the last few days.

See you at the next scan.

Not Quite Ripley