Sarah's Transition Diary .. days 1177 - 1204

.... is for those who might want to contact me about my diary.

Memory Joggers ...

23.55 .. I’m in bed.

01.10 .. I’ve realised something is missing .. I can’t get comfortable .. I reach for the wedge. I soon drop off.

07.02 .. I’m already awake as Karen brings the tea in ..

07.35 .. Full of good intention I get up and head downstairs .. loo and breakfast.

10.30 .. I’m just about to head up to dilate when there is a knock on the front door .. I can see a city link van outside .. my first e-buyer order for sure. I slip into my dressing gown and answer the door.

I wasn’t wrong .. massive box with Karen’s belated birthday present .. a 10" digital photo frame, and two 2Gb 150x SD cards .. but an additional high speed 1Gb card I ordered isn’t here .. hmmm.

I leave the digital photo frame for Karen to open later, and head up to do my dilation.

11.10 .. I’m finally in that position.

12.20 .. I’m cooked.

15.15 .. I head for the Honda garage at Ottershaw to get some wiper blades for the Jazz.

15.50 .. I’m at Linda’s, and got the timing spot on .. she’s just put the kettle on .. LOL.

16.45 .. Susan returns home from work .. I get a warm hello from her too.

17.20 .. I head for home ..

17.35 .. I’m home ..

I set up Karen’s photo frame and copy some pictures onto one of the two new 2Gb SD cards. It works pretty well.

19.15 .. Dinner is served .. it’s M&S matured Scottish Aberdeen Angus peppered rump steak  .. served with a small salad and “new” potatoes. Pudding is a slice of lemon meringue pie with a little ice cream.

21.45 .. I’m finally in that position .. late again ..

23.25 .. I’m cooked .. time to get sorted sorted

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ...

00.10 .. I climb into bed. I wedge myself with the small pillow / cushion and soon fall to sleep.

07.01 .. I wake up as Karen brings the tea in ..

07.25 .. I head downstairs .. loo and breakfast. I do a quick weight check before I eat my breakfast .. 13st 9lb .. a half pound drop and I haven’t managed to do a number 2 yet .. and I need to pre dilation to be honest. Breakfast is topped off with a sachet of Movicol.

09.15 .. I’m back in the bathroom and on the throne .. eventually things come to pass .. and how !! Dilation should be easy now.

09.35 .. I’m finally in that position .. as per recent days, I’m 1.5" short initially .. and it takes 20 minutes to get to depth.

10.50 .. I’m cooked .. time to clean up and shower.

11.35 .. I’m clean and creamed. Time to get dressed.

12.55 .. I head for Boot’s in Camberley .. as I enter the town a 30 minute parking bay empties in front of me .. that’ll do nicely, specially as Boots is visible from where I’ve parked.

In Boot’s, it soon becomes clear that there online offers are not the same as the stores, well this store. So I get a couple of 3 packs of there condoms to try tonight .. ok .. I need 2 condoms for each dilating session. I also get some more pads and a small bottle of feminine skin wash. 

I head for a card shop to get a mothers day card and also a quick blitz through Barratts shoes, loads of size 9, but no size 10's.

13.40 .. I head back to Lightwater to pick up the last of my prescription and get a couple of item’s from Budgen’s.

13.55 .. The chemist has bad news for me .. Betadine / Poldine is no longer available .. what ?? .. the pharmacist is at a loss too .. so it’s got to be back to the doctors again. At least I have no problem getting loo rolls and big carton of orange juice in Budgen’s.

14.15 .. I’m home .. time for a quick lunch .. a chicken sandwich left by Karen followed by an apple and a banana.

14.25 .. I do the washing up left in the sink and start on a little cleaning up in the lounge ..
 
15.35 .. “Jennifer” arrives .. we haven’t seen each other for ages so have a lot to catch up on. At one point I was led to believe she was reversing her transition .. this appears to be untrue.

We play with our camera’s .. Jennifer at a 10M pixel Nikon DSLR .. so it’s a similar spec to my one .. though older. Jennifer decides mine is a little sharper .. I’m not so shure.

18.40 .. “Jennifer” heads home ..

19.20 .. I head to Lightwater to collect Dinner .. but there is a massive queue and wait in the chippy.

19.45 .. I’m back .. time to eat .. It’s a half chicken and chips, a pot of curry sauce to share for chip dunking .. washed down with orange juice. A slice of lemon meringue pie with a little ice cream.

20.05 .. Dinner is done ..

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ...
           
07.05 .. I’m awake .. this is auto pilot mode from Karen bringing me tea during the week .. I take a large drink of water and snuggle down. Karen’s actually facing my way so I’ve got something nice to look at .. << smiles >>.

It’s the Saturday morning weigh in ... 13st 9lb .. well it’s good that my weight is stable,

09.45 .. I’m in that position.

14.00 .. Lunch time .. chicken sandwich,

17.05 .. I head off to my mum’s .. alone .. Karen doesn’t want to go.

17.25 .. I’m in my mum’s .. we chat about a few things

19.00 .. I finally boot the laptop .. and give my mum a bit of a slide show of some of what I’d seen in Thailand .. but I’ve got a load of pictures and we only get through about half when I realise the time.

Mum’s parting shot is that she wants to take Karen and I out for lunch tomorrow .. she’s going to ring Karen to see if she’s alright with that.

20.05 .. I finally head home, I try to call Karen on the home phone as I leave the flat complex front door .. too late .. mum has beaten me to it. I call her mobile, she answers .. Karen didn’t answer the call from my mum, mum’s now leaving a message on the answer phone.

20.20 .. I’m home .. and I’m hungry .. we quickly decide what we want and I phone the order through, but it’s a 20 minute wait. I depart for the Chinese and Karen gets another call from my mum .. << grimace >>.

21.00 .. I’m back with the food ..

21.20 .. The food has gone, and it’s late .. I have something to do ..

21.45 .. I’m in that position .. and it doesn’t go very smoothly. I’m starting to worry about the time it takes to get to depth .. it’s getting more uncomfortable too .. I’m going to have to start taking pain killers soon I suspect.

22.15 .. I’m finally at depth with number 2 .. 15 minutes quality time ..

23.20 .. I’m sore and shattered .. at least I’m cooked so I can go and clean and cream. I feel like I could do with the loo .. however sitting on the throne is non productive .. << grimace >>.

I really must stop watching TV while doing the drudgery, I can’t use the laptop, I need to start listening to some music .. I’ll have to go get a cheapie DVD player to stick on the TV.

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ...

00.20 .. I finally climb into bed.

06.00 .. I’m awake and very dry .. I drink half my water glass and snuggle down .. I’m out like a light.

08.05 .. I’m awake again .. bum .. I really wanted to get up about 07.00 .. like I’ve woken up most mornings on auto pilot.

08.10 .. I get up and head for the bathroom .. I’m a little worried about not passing anything solid in 2 days .. hmmm .. so I sit and wait .. eventually something did happen.

08.35 .. I’m in the kitchen ..

12.12 .. We are at my mum’s ..

12.25 .. We are in the restaurant .. mum’s favourite .. Villa Rosa ..

Lunch is a rack of lamb .. with vegetables .. it’s OK but nothing special. However I go for a fresh Mango for dessert .. that is just heaven .. all washed down with lemonade and water.

14.10 .. We are back in my mum’s flat ..

14.35 .. We are back home ..

18.30 .. Tea is .. bread, cheese and venison sausage .. I save some bread for some honey .. lovely.

I call my sister Juliet .. to discuss what to do with the American’s when they arrive next month .. that is how they are going to meet Juliet, Robert, Dad & Dee.

21.20 .. I finally go up to dilate .. I wash and everything for the night first and done my nightie, topped with a sweatshirt for warmth.

21.45 .. I’m in that position.

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ..

23.55 .. I’m in bed .. can I sleep .. noooooo.

01.00 .. I’m thirsty and realise I’ve got no water by my bed .. I have to get up and fetch it.

I didn’t really sleep very well at all .. I kept wedging myself and getting comfortable, then wake up sans wedge a few minutes later ..

07.00 .. I wake up as Karen brings in cups of tea .. is it really morning ..

07.35 .. With good intension, I head downstairs, use the loo and then quickly check my e-mails as I eat my breakfast .. that was fatal .. I have a few e-mails to answer .. and time flies, specially when Julie pops up for a chat on Yahoo. I need to get organised. What’s the time ????

11.10 .. I’m finally in that position ..

12.45 .. I’m cooked .. just need to clean, shower and cream.

13.30 .. Time for lunch .. finally .. a corned beef sandwich, an apple, a pineapple yoghurt and a glass of orange juice.

14.00 I check my e-mails .. I’ve had a reply from one I sent earlier to Laura and I do a reply to the clinic on last weeks offering from them .. which wasn’t particularly helpful.

15.05 .. I head for Camberley .. I need to get a supply of condoms to last me through to Thursday .. when an awful lot is going to arrive .. 45 days supply .. @ 4 a day .. I wasn’t going to buy that lot in a branch of Boots or any other chemist, I don’t need that sort of reputation .. LOL .. just hope the delivery driver doesn’t know the contents either .. << grimace >>.   

15.50 .. I’m in Comet’s in Farnborough to pick up a £29.95 Philips DVD player for the TV in the spare room. The young chap who I approached for help was a little short in height .. and couldn’t spot the two samples on a shelf I had. I could have reached, but he called a very tall colleague across to assist .. << giggles >>.

16.10 .. I’m in Maplin’s in Farnborough .. with several missions. I need a scart lead for the new DVD player .. I ended up buying a split cable by mistake .. but actually it works and could be handy in the future. The watch batteries for my mum are sorted, but I need some SCSI cables, external ones, and here I hit a brick wall .. Maplin are no longer stocking SCSI bits .. what is the world coming too .. so I’ll have to find a specialist supplier.

16.25 .. I head for home .. traffic to and on the M3 is pretty slow, with streams of traffic leaving the various “science parks” to the north east of Farnborough.

16.55 .. As I leave the M3 a black BMW estate suddenly cuts across in front of me, luck I’m sharp.

17.10 .. I’m home .. so’s Karen who is on the computer doing a Tesco’s order. I return to the car to collect the DVD player from the boot .. time for me to have a play upstairs.

Well it all works .. but not as I’d expected thanks to the awful Alba freeview box. It has to be switched on and TV/DVD selected for the DVD signal to pass through .. what !!!!.

An experiment with a DVD-RW disc and Nero creates me a disc with all my laptop MP3's on it to try and play on the DVD player .. eventually I work it out .. it works .. << smiles >>.

19.10 .. Dinner is served .. it’s two half portions of chicken dishes that had been made by Karen and then frozen, both are really nice .. pudding is orange jelly and ice cream.

19.35 .. Dinner is over .. time for a little diary.

I have a chat on Yahoo with a rubberist friend called Lynn .. “she” is an ex colleague of mine from 20 years ago I discovered a while ago, and she’s heavily into rubber.

20.30 .. I say goodbye to Lynn .. I really need to do an earlier dilation tonight and again in the morning, should have two deliveries arriving tomorrow.

However, I messed around for a while then Karen remembered “Mrs In-Betweeny” on BBC3 ..

21.00 .. So we sit and watch the programme .. I should really have had my head in gear and recorded it, I’m sure it will be on again, and with luck it could spring a mini series. It was really good and showed TS’s in a good light in the main, it was very down to earth.

22.00 .. I head for the bathroom .. to prep for a dilation ..

22.20 .. I’m in that position .. finally .. but tonight I’m doing it to the sound of enigma .. the relaxation certainly helps .. though it doesn’t help my time to full depth.

23.45 .. I’m sorted .. cooked .. time for the clean and cream session. Gosh the skin on my legs is really getting dry from being washed and showered twice a day .. I’m cracking up for sure .. well my skin is.

More to come ...

00.20 .. I’m in bed .. I wedge myself and try and find that sweet spot .. takes ages.

I didn’t sleep to well again .. not sure why the last couple of nights has been so difficult, I got very thirsty again.

07.10 .. I’m out of bed before Karen .. I need to try and get my dilation sorted early. I sort my self out in the loo then head for the kitchen .. a quick weight check .. 13st 10 1/4 lb .. well it’s post weekend and a couple of filling meals .. hopefully this will drop off, especially if I’m good at lunch times .. if.

I boot the PC and print a quick note to stick in the letter box for the two delivery drivers I’m expecting today, asking them to give me time to reach the door, City Post drivers knock, wait about 5 seconds then walk away .. well last weeks one did.

A quick e-mail check finds a reply from Rosalyn .. the Canadian girl I met in Chon Buri .. she’s a day older than me .. it’s nice to hear from her, apparently she’d been thinking about me .. just as I’ve been thinking of her. She wants to hear from me more often .. that’s a mutual feeling .. seems that Chon Buri does have a bonding effect on all those that meet there .. 

08.15 .. I’m in that position .. I start to dilate and soon start to fill a bit chilled .. damn .. I forgot to crank the heating up .. so I pull the duvet over me .. brrrr.

09.40 .. I’m cooked .. so I get up and shower off. I’m just dried off when I hear a knock at the door .. I find my dressing gown and go down stairs to sign for my first parcel .. it’s the new radio for the Cavalier ..

I finish my clean and cream routine, I lay on the bed for a short while. I took a new supplement at breakfast .. it’s a high concentration vitamin C and B orange drink .. and I’m feeling a bit better .. coincidence probably.

11.20 .. I call the company I ordered a “Video stabilizer” from Sunday night just to make sure it was despatched yesterday .. it wasn’t, they are in South Wales and had a power cut yesterday, so it didn’t get sent, so I’ve asked them to delay it till tomorrow, so it should arrive on Thursday, along with my Boot’s order ..

12.38 .. My company phone rings .. it’s Andrew from Cardiff .. it’s not a good connection and at times it’s hard to understand him .. we chat about work related things for quite a while .. some things he tells me is has me worrying about the future.

12.56 .. Call over and I’m hungry .. time for lunch .. it’s a corned beef sandwich, an apple, a plain chocolate Kit Kat with a little chocolate on the side .. << grimace >>.

I’ve got a sink full of washing up to do again, seems like this might be my chore for the next five weeks.

13.45 .. The washing up is done .. phew. To the PC .. I check my e-mails and contemplate answering a few I’m feeling really guilty about this .. going visible on Yahoo was a mistake.

14.30 .. I’ve been wanting to reply to a few e-mails from the last two months from diary readers, specially around the beginning to middle of January. I couldn’t get my diary ones on my laptop initially in Thailand, so I couldn’t reply then, and only now feel I have the energy to do so .. so I answer about 24 e-mails from diary readers .. to be honest I’m touched so many sent e-mails wishing me well during that period .. a couple even sent electronic or PDF scans of cards .. << smiles >>. Though I write a block to copy and paste, each one gets personalised to some extent, as some had asked questions I try to answer. 

16.20 .. Karen is home .. just as In finish the last ones.

16.40 .. I do an e-mail to Melissa in the USA, the family friend, trying to get a contact phone number or Skype ID .. we need to chat on the phone really to try and organise a few things for their visit to the UK in April .. so many things are in the air at the moment.

17.00 .. I send a text message to Melissa in USA to check her e-mail.

17.45 .. The phone rings .. it’s my mum’s special ring tone, I get the short straw. She starts to ramble on in the way only she can, do I need a 10 minute explanation of recent history to discover why she needs a new light fitting .. so I suggest’s she cuts to the chase after 5 minutes “sorry you haven’t got the time” .. click .. I’m not going to chase that up .. I’m uncomfortable down below and I’m not in the mood for her moans.

18.30 .. Dinner is served .. pork & “blue cheese” sausages .. with baked beans and “new” potatoes. Pudding is orange, fig and honey ice cream .. was a bit more than a portion really .. but Karen wanted it finished .. from the tub .. << grimace >>.

18.50 .. Dinner is over ..

19.05 .. Marie from Oxford way pops up for a chat on Yahoo .. this is probably going to be a little predictable .. but actually it’s not and a few new things come up .. including the question so many are asking .. so that was predictable I guess .. “what does it feel like ?” .. “natural” is my usual answer.

19.43 .. I spot Kylie in Turo on line as I swap PC’s .. we have quite a chat ..

20.21 .. Kylie has to go ..

20.30 .. Karen brings me a cup of tea “drink that and get upstairs” .. if only that was an invitation .. LOL .. but I know what she means .. dilation calls ..

21.00 .. I’m finally in the position .. and I’m watching BBC2, it’s a programme about the hunt for “another Earth” .. rivetting stuff .. I mean I’m interested in this stuff .. we can’t be alone in the whole of space ..

I got to depth fairly quickly .. well to do the whole thing in 75 mins is good for me at the moment, though I was using more pressure than normal.

22.15 .. I’m cooked .. and I beat Karen into the bathroom .. just .. she moans, I offer to vacate for her but she tells me to continue .. so I do.

22.55 .. I’m creamed and sorted and in bed .. Karen soon appears from the bathroom. I do get a cuddle, briefly .. nightie night.

Completed from memory and memory joggers Wednesday 5th March.

Memory Joggers ...

Well I didn’t sleep well again, in fact I saw most of the hours go by on the clock.

07.00 .. Karen brings a cup of tea in.

07.15 .. Karen heads for the bathroom .. I lay there for a while .. though I know I need to get on, I want to take part in the engineering conference call at 10.00.

07.35 .. I head down stairs to the loo and the kitchen routine.

In the kitchen, I do a quick weight check .. 13st 9lb .. phew .. I boot the PC as I snaffle my breakfast. There’s a reply from Melissa in the states .. looks like I’ll have to make a call to her on Friday when she’s at home to iron a few things out.

08.35 .. I’m in that position .. I really need to crack on with this to make that call at 10.00.

It takes an age to get to depth with number 2 .. nearly 30 minutes again, but I’m determined to maintain this.

09.20 .. Number 3 is in, I’m against the clock .. that was till I felt a little chilly and pulled the duvet across me .. somehow I managed to doze off .. bottom .. LOL ..

10.45 .. I wake with a start .. the dilator is still in but I’m not at depth .. that’s blown the engineering conference call then.

10.55 .. I’m at depth .. let the quality time start.

11.10 .. I’m cooked .. I head for the bathroom, clean, shower and cream session.

11.45 .. I’m all sorted and get so I get dressed.

13.00 .. I’m hungry .. time for lunch .. it’s a chicken sandwich, and apple and dark chocolate Kit Kat, washed down with orange juice like the doctor ordered.

13.28 .. I make contact with Linda on Yahoo, and arrange to pop in later when I’ve done my shopping.

13.40 .. I need to do some washing up. As I’m doing it a van suddenly pulls up outside and the driver gets out with a parcel .. hmmmm .. now what is this. It’s the Boot’s order that was supposed to be delivered tomorrow, I chose the day .. now what if I wasn’t in .. having specified Thursday .. hmmmm. Luckily the box is a plain brown one .. no indication of the contents .. 180 condoms and 10 tubes of K-Y .. there wasn’t a van full of police waiting to rush in either.

15.05 .. I head off to do my various chores .. first stop is the computer shop at Knowle Green .. to try for a SCSI2 cable .. no joy .. “search for a supplier on the web” is the only advice.

15.25 .. Next stop .. WTCR in Virginia Water .. I need an ISO socket to wire ends to adapt the Cavalier radio wireless loom to take the new CD/SD/USB/MP3/Radio I had delivered on Tuesday.

15.55 .. I’m at Linda’s ..

18.10 .. I'm home ..

19.05 .. Dinner is served .. Jambalaya ( Tesco’s have delivered ) followed by an Apricot yoghurt .. and a “few” milk chocolate after eight mints .. Karen’s favourite.

19.38 .. Davina pops a message up ..

I talk to my sister Juliet about the American’s visiting .. Sunday 13th is good for her ..

I do an e-mail to Melissa in the USA .. and try to arrange a phone call Friday evening from here.

20.42 .. Julie pops up on messenger ..

21.40 .. I realise the time .. bum ..

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ...

00.30 .. I’m finally in bed .. nightie night.

I’m not sure why but wedge or not, I just haven’t been able to get comfortable the last few nights, and it’s not changed.

06.15 .. I’m awake and very dry .. I watch and listen to Karen sleeping for a while then dose off.

06.58 .. The tea is early .. << grimace >> .. time for a cuddle then .. nope .. << sulks >>.

07.25 .. I head downstairs and do the usual .. a weight check .. 13st 9lb .. looking good.

I boot the PC and munch my breakfast while I check my e-mails .

08.15 .. Warning .. Beware if you get an e-mail from a “friend” asking you to click on a link that might take you to “Fanbox” .. I stupidly did and it signs you up without any prior warning .. it’s web forms don’t seem to work and I can't find out how to unsubscribe .. NOooooooooo .. grrrrrrrr.

08.59 .. Christine calls my PC Skype account and we web cam together .. gosh she’s looking good, slightly different, more feminine after her FFS 8 days ago. Once the swelling has gone she should look amazing. She jokes about the cost of eyeshadow, as now she’ll be able to wear it, I quip back that to match the current colours of her eyes she’ll need to buy a few MAC pots .. LOL.

09.45 .. I’m finally in that position .. this is getting me down for sure .. it is a drudgery, but I know I have to persevere.

11.20 .. I am cooked .. time to clean up, shower and cream.

11.30 .. I’m just off the loo when there is a knock at the door .. what timing .. I gram my dressing gown and rush down to the door. It’s my video “synchroniser” .. well it’s not really technically, but it replaces all the synchronising pulses in a video signal, improving picture stability and removing unwanted “signals” .. hmmm .. that’s useful isn’t it.

I return upstairs to finish the clean and cream and get dressed.

12.10 .. I’m back down stairs, and hookup the new kit between the cheapy DVD player I got Monday and our DVD recorder .. sorted .. a DVD that I couldn’t “back up” for Claire now records fine, even if it has to be in real time. DVD number 1 is going.

12.55 .. Lunch .. a chicken sandwich, a hot cross bun, an apple, a dark chocolate Kit Kat and some orange juice.

A couple more DVD’s get backed up. I do some diary ..

18.10 .. Dinner is served .. meatballs on pasta tubes .. pudding is a slice of tart au pomme.

Sadly time flies when your enjoying yourself .. I’m showing Karen how to do things on the PC ..

22.15 .. I’m finally in that position ..

00.25 .. I’m in bed .. nightie night

More to come ...

07.01 .. I’m woken up as Karen brings the tea in ..

07.25 .. I head downstairs to do what I need to do .. the scales frighten me .. they must be faulty.

I boot the PC and check my e-mails ..

08.45 .. This must be a record this week .. I’m in that position .. but it’s not good news .. I’m pretty sore today for some reason and it takes nearly 30 minutes till I’m satisfied I’m at my depth .. << grimace >>.

09.30 .. Time to change to number 3 .. it takes 5 minutes to get depth. 

09.55 .. I’m cooked .. luxury .. just wish it was. Time to shower, dress and get myself sorted, got a few things to do today.

10.55 .. I’m all sorted .. dressed as well and head down stairs.

I set another DVD going to make Claire a functional backup ..

12.50 .. A cup of french “Thai” soup, followed by a coronation chicken sandwich and an apple.

14.05 .. My Skype phone rings .. it’s Christine in Thailand .. she’s in her usual good humour and soon has me giggling .. she flies back 2 weeks today.

I need to re-rig the recorder arrangement with the DVD recorder so that I can dub to DVD a couple of Claire’s ancient video tapes she loves to watch. Easier said than done, I end up removing my skirt so I can climb in behind the TV and recorder stack to change the plugging .. I swap a couple of leads so that I have the longest cables free to use for other things.

14.45 .. Well the first video is now dubbing .. that should make Claire happy when we go there Saturday week.

15.24 .. Bobbi, an ex moderator and now ex member of SRSinThailand, had left me a message earlier and I answer .. she answers but she’s just about to go out .. so we’ll chat later. I must be honest with the current actions and attitude of one of the groups co owners / moderators I’m seriously reconsidering my role and membership .. it’s getting to much like a mirror site for Dr Chets girls club group .. which isn’t good, sadly, little I can do about it.

15.30 .. Finally get to talk to Melissa in America on Skype .. she can see me on web cam, she promises to get her camera running. We chat about all sorts, our mums ( moms for her ) our kids and my trip to Thailand. She has a friend out there who had SRS about 20 years ago, so she’s really fine talking to me she says. I’ll excuse her compliments of how good I look as low resolution of the web cam .. << LOL >>. Seems our mums have a lot in common when it comes to how they are .. sadly.

16.05 .. I say goodbye to Melissa .. she has some work to do, I need to go do some shopping before Karen returns. I set another video dubbing before I leave.

16.20 .. I’m in Waitrose in Sunningdale .. it’s been a long time since I’ve been in here .. << grimace >>.

A trip to the bank on the way home .. where I realise Karen still has one of my bank cards .. DOH .. but there’s a largish stash built up in my other account .. that will have to do.

17.10 .. I’m home .. so is Karen .. a cup of tea and a hot cross bun ..
 
19.10 .. Dinner part one is served .. Tesco Thai chicken soup .. DOH .. but it’s better than the lunch time sample .. Part two is stuffed pasta in tomato and Muscaponi sauce .. pudding .. is a slice of Waitrose Mango tart .. stunning .. yummy.

20.00 .. I’m back at the PC and spot Bobbi Swan, has left me a message .. I answer and we chat solidly .. she’s had an amazing life .. rather puts me in the shade and she’s done it all far more publically than me.

20.50 .. I finish the chat with Bobbi .. I need to go and do the drudgery .. such is life.

22.00 .. After finishing messing around and gone through the bathroom with the pre bed routine I can finally get into that position .. I’ve got to be more disciplined about this. 

Completed from memory Saturday 8th March.

00.30 .. I’m finally in bed, Karen is snoozing as expected, I cover her up a little more and wedge myself trying to get comfortable.

Well I did sleep a little better than most nights last week ..

06.40 .. I’m awake and very thirsty ..

08.15 .. I get up to sort myself out pre dilation and make the tea. Oh the luxury of using the upstairs ( warmer ) loo. I then go down to sort breakfast and make the tea. It’s the Saturday morning weigh in before breakfast .. 13st 11 lb isn’t good .. I’m going to have to start walking everyday when the weather allows to burn calories and build my stamina up.

09.02 .. I’m back in the bedroom with the tea, we watch the news and drink our tea .. time for a cuddle .. It’s soo good to be able to snuggle up and get cosy.

10.05 .. This isn’t good enough .. I get up and go to the loo and head for the spare room.

10.25 .. I’m in that position .. I think I must be getting near the tightening stage, well I’m 8 weeks next Wednesday .. as this morning I’m over 1.5 Thai inches short of my depth. It’s an uncomfortable 30 minutes to get to what looks like depth.

11.15 .. I change for number 3 .. and it’s another shock .. over an inch short of my expected depth with this one .. normally it’s about half an inch or a little more. However it takes little over ten minutes to get to depth.

11.40 .. Very timely, Karen clicks open the lock on the bathroom door as I’m now cooked. Time for the bathroom.

12.15 .. I’ve cleaned, showered, creamed and got dressed. I head down to the kitchen to see what is what.

12.40 .. I log into the PC and check my e-mails. I’m not sure why we are getting so many cross posted items in the SRSinThailand group, especially as the person doing it should know better, I’m not sure why the poll results of one group should be copied and pasted into another, specially when it’s a poll about FtoM’s on the other group related to a specific clinic .. SRSinThailand stated mission is for MtoF’s only .. so I don’t see if it’s even of interest, or should be.

13.00 .. Lunch is served .. a chicken sandwich, some olives that I bought yesterday in Waitrose ( shame I can’t taste them very well ) and some savoury nibbles. A date and cranberry hot cross bun completes the deal.

I check my e-mails and start some diary for today, and “finish” yesterdays.

14.00 .. Karen heads off to see Mandy her friend for a couple of hours, leaving me to do some diary and try and catch up with a few friends on Yahoo. I haven’t seen Audrey in the USA on line for a while, so I send her an off liner to see if she’ll answer later .. I’m a little bit worried about her, she wasn’t finding it easy the last time we chatted keeping up with of the self maintenance aspects, her BA maintenance I can’t help with as I didn’t have mine done.

I boot my old PC and my “server” for the first time since I’ve been home .. there is a shed load of updates to do on each.

17.25 .. I call Karen to see where she is .. 2 minutes away apparently.

17.40 .. We head for my mum’s .. stopping to top up our lottery ticket.

18.00 .. We arrive at my mum’s ( we discover later she’d phoned us 5 minutes earlier but hadn’t left a message) .. “ I thought you weren’t coming”. Well it’s much of the usual routine .. she tells us how ill she’s been in the last week for 20 minutes, then makes us a cup of tea and we eat her biscuits for comfort.

19.00 .. We have had enough .. and head for home via Bagshot to collect a Chinese that I order en route. It’s drizzly rain as we go and the wind is getting up as I get out of the car in Bagshot.

19.20 .. I’m in the Chinese, Mary acknowledges my arrival with a welcome smile. They are quite busy, but the food comes out at about the 15 minutes she said it would be.

19.35 .. We are home .. time to eat.

20.00 .. I boot the PC and sort out a few things .. I need to get some ink for my printer, I delayed doing it a week ago and it seems it’s still the same company doing the Canon CLI-8 series cartridges the cheapest .. MX2 .. so I order the cheap set option and an extra black cartridge. We’ve run out of DVD+R’s as well, and this company is doing a good deal on a 50 spindle of TDK ones ..£10.99 delivered.

21.00 .. I do a quick check on Yahoo, and find an off liner from Gaynor in Guildford .. we’ve been passing like ships in the night for days .. I reply . she’s there .. so we chat for a while even though I should be upstairs doing the drudgery at this time. Checking my e-mails I find one from my business partner .. DOH .. something else he reminds me off .. something I was going to do a week ago and didn’t.

21.20 .. I exit the conversation with Gaynor .. I really must get on with “things”.

21.55 .. I’m washed and in my nightie .. time for the drudgery.

22.00 .. I’m in that position. It’s a repeat of the routine, 30 minutes to really get to depth .. << sighs >>.

23.35 .. I’m cooked .. and really not happy about the length of time it’s taking, and wondering if the dreaded 8 - 12 week period has crept up on me unawares and this is why it’s taking so long.

23.55 .. I’ve cleaned and creamed .. a quick trip downstairs to turn the heating down and collect my water .. nightie night.

Completed from memory Sunday March 9th.

Well I slept reasonably well after taking my time to find that “sweet” spot with the wedge.

I remember being woken up by Karen at one point in the night and I turned her side over bed light on .. I don’t remember her returning though .. LOL. 

06.00 .. I’m awake and warm .. I feel stuffy so I get up and open the window a little more .. a drink of water before falling asleep again.

07.05 .. I’m awake and thirsty .. and take a large swig of water .. and falling asleep.

09.25 .. I wake with a start .. oh hell .. look at the time. I drink some water and lay there for a little while. I soon get up and head down stairs via the loo for a comfort break. Well I’m impressed .. over nine hours through the night .. no accidents .. I think I can try losing the towel I’ve been sleeping on for the last three weeks.

I go down stairs to sort the kitchen routine out. I’m getting worried about our scales .. in 13st 11lb again, when I really was expecting to put at least a pound on yesterday .. and the fact little happened this morning.

10.00 .. I return to the bedroom with cups of tea .. and put the TV on. The tea has soon gone, time to snatch a quick cuddle .. ruddy drudgery is interfering with life big style .. but I had sort of expected this.

10.30 .. I head for the spare room via the loo .. time to get things sorted.

10.45 .. I’m in the position .. I flip the Tv on to see what will amuse me .. not a lot .. shame the DVD / CD player is still down stairs ..

12.15 .. I’m cooked, I’m sure Karen hasn’t been in the bathroom .. I head there and it’s empty .. so be it. I sort myself out .. my hair will do another day .. well I guess I should do it before I head to the doctors tomorrow.

12.50 .. I’m sorted, cleaned, creamed, dressed and now downstairs. Karen is on the settee talking on the phone .. in her dressing gown .. so she hasn’t been through the bathroom. I set to doing the washing up in the sink from yesterday .. I think a kitchen refurb is necessary, it’s over 30 years old .. original I am sure .. along with a dish washer. Sadly there is nowhere to fit a dish washer at the moment.

13.30 .. The washing up is done .. I head for the bottle bank down by the local pub with a collection of empties. I detour down to the village shops just to check out when our doctors leaving farewell public meeting is .. it’s Wednesday at 13.30 .. I’ll have to go .. I owe him a great deal.

14.05 .. Lunch is served ..

The job I should have done last week is now done .. I just need to wait for a phone call now from a bank to sort the final details.

I hit upon Amazon after doing a search for “ERA group music” and start listening to samples of other groups that another ERA fan has suggested  .. “Magna Canta”, “Illumination”, “Auracle” and “Mysteria” .. some very similar sounds. Suddenly an odd link throws me into Enigma .. and I discover a few Enigma CD’s I haven’t got .. the samples are definitely the Enigma I love .. so I’ve got a shopping list for “Voyager” from 2003 and “A Posteriori” from 2006. There’s also a remix edition of their LSD album .. along with a couple of DVD versions with striking visuals apparently. The samples from the re-mixed “LSD” album are not good .. I’m not going after that, I prefer the originals for sure.  

19.05 .. Dinner is served .. Cannelloni .. with potato & courgette rosti and garlic bread .. Pudding after that mountain was Strawberries and a little ice cream. 

19.58 .. Gill from Haywards Heath replies to a message I sent earlier .. we chat for a short while .. looks like Cassandra’s New Home group on MSN might be closed because of inactivity .. that’ll be a shame.

I do a little more raking through Amazon listening to clips .. there are quite a few bands making Enigma / ERA type music .. “Achillea”, “Delerium”, “Lunascape” and “Lesiem” to name but a few .. all I need now is to find them and maybe buy a few .. but not all at once .. .

20.50 .. I have to call it a day .. time to go do the drudgery ..

22.05 .. I’m finally in that position, this isn’t good ( early ) enough .. let the drudgery begin. And it takes ages ..

23.10 .. There is a roaring noise in the back ground .. that’ll be the rain and wind outside.

00.30 .. I finally climb into bed ..

01.15 .. I look at the clock .. the wind is howling outside.

06.01 .. The “alarm” goes off .. accept this was the low battery alarm .. DOH. I lay there for a while and drift off eventually.

06.45 .. The alarm goes off for real .. I’m soon out of bed .. this is going to be very odd .. I’ve got to shower and get to the doctors for 08.00.

06.50 .. I’m in the bathroom .. and set to sorting myself out in record time ..

07.18 .. I’m back in the bedroom, hair in a towel .. I done some underwear and my dressing gown and go downstairs to dry my hair. However, when I put my knickers on, as I hadn’t creamed, I did without a pad .. wow .. now that is soooo comfortable .. honestly. I’ll look forward to the time when I don’t have to cream.

07.40 .. I’m back in the bedroom to finish dressing, put a pad in my knickers just in case, and put my hair clips in. I ask Karen for the clips I left on the bathroom window sill .. while my back is turned they get hurled out of the bathroom door .. I can find one .. it takes Karen’s help to find the other.

07.50 .. I’m in the drive, I need to move the Jazz into the road so I can use my car for the doctors.

08.00 .. I’m in the doctors, waiting to be booked in at the receptionists window when my old GP passes, he turns and returns to talk to me .. he’s such a nice guy. I promise to go to his “farewell” on Wednesday afternoon in the church hall, he’s going to be one hard act to follow. The receptionist eventually acknowledges my existence and I take a seat to wait.

08.04 .. I’m called through to the vampires room for my blood test. Hmmmm .. although this one is in her later years I think she’s got “L” plates. First she needs to look up how many phials of blood she needs to fill .. three. She doesn’t clean my skin before thrusting a needle in my left arm .. which misses the vein .. great !!. So she decides to try the right arm .. I’m feeling a little faint at this point. So she jabs me again without cleaning the skin, at least with another clean needle. Success .. she finds a vein .. and starts to fill the 3 tubes. She talks to me about my surgery “ you’ve been away for surgery haven’t you ..where ?”

“Thailand, as I had to pay myself I wanted what I thought would be the best” .. she thinks I am very brave to do what I have .. I don’t know why, to me it was just a case of wanting to continue living.

08.11 .. The torture is over .. I try to book an appointment to see the doctor next week .. what a joke .. I’ll have to use there 0844 high cost phone line to book an “emergency” appointment on the day for something that should be routine.

I head off home via the bank in Sunningdale .. I need to get a balance on one of my accounts .. unfortunately the machine is out of service. I head back to home.

08.45 .. I am home .. time for breakfast and pills. I boot the PC and check my e-mails ..

10.00 .. I head upstairs to prepare for a dilation ..

10.15 .. I’m in that position .. it’s another time consuming one, things are getting less comfortable.

11.18 .. I’ve changed to number 3 and almost reached depth when the phone rings .. it’s somebody from Claire’s new care home .. this rather puts me off my stride.

11.45 .. I’m cooked .. time to clean and cream.

12.05 .. I’m back down stairs dressed again .. back to the PC .. I want to try and finish some more photo pages.

12.30 .. I try calling the secretary of the solicitor dealing with my late uncles affairs .. she’s at lunch, I’m promised a call back .. a hollow promise.

12.40 .. Time for lunch .. it’s a chicken slice sandwich .. an apple and a banana .. working class lunch.

After lunch I do my best not to get involved in chats on Yahoo .. twice I went invisible to avoid what appeared to be Arab males hitting on me.

So I spend some time going though what I’ve got photograph wise, selecting what I can use without creating too much site traffic.

14.30 .. I get a text message from Lloyds TSB saying an account manager will call me ..  question is .. when ?? .. well I can confirm it wasn’t today.

I take a break from sorting photographs to look at the leaflet I was sent along with my appointment letter for my mammogram tomorrow. One of the instructions is that I shouldn’t wear talcum powder or spray on deodorant after I shower .. it’s an early afternoon appointment too .. nice. This might be an opportunity to go shopping in M&S for knickers as the mobile unit I have to attend will be in the Tesco car park at The Meadows in Camberley, so I’ll be next door.

Well I’ve sorted and resized quite a few photographs .. I just need to build the supporting pages.

18.00 .. I break away to put the dinner on .. well it’s ready made food from Waitrose, though Karen normally sorts this I’m going to give it a try. I’m reading the instructions when Karen enters the kitchen and starts doing things her way ..

19.00 .. Dinner is served .. Piri Piri  chicken with roast potatoes .. I open a bottle of red wine too .. it’s been a while. Dessert is the last of the Mango tart .. with a little ice cream.

19.25 .. Dinner is over .. we head for the lounge.

19.30 .. My company mobile rings .. it’s Andrew from Cardiff, trying to fill me in on what he’s heard about “my place” .. and I tell him what I know. The problem is the company that owns us is worse than MI5 .. they really keep the staff in the dark .. including me, not that I’m anything special, just the stations engineer.

19.45 .. Andrew says goodbye .. back to the PC after a quick snuggle up to Karen .. Corry is on, so I can’t interfere with that if I want to live.

20.00 .. Back to the picture pages .. for the diary ..

21.10 .. I’ve sorted up to day 17 in Chon Buri now .. picture wise ..

21.45 .. Where does the time go .. I’m finally in that position. It’s the same story .. 30 minutes to get depth with number 2 .. and horror .. nearly 15 minutes to get depth with number 3 .. this really isn’t looking very good.

23.25 .. I’m cooked .. and head for the bathroom to clean up before returning to cream.

00.02 .. I’m finally in bed .. nightie night.

Memory Joggers ...

I got to sleep pretty quick I think once wedged .. well I don’t remember laying awake long.

07.02 .. I’m woken up as Karen returns with cups of tea .. I’m quite dry and my water glass is still full, so I didn’t stir much then .. << smiles >>.

07.25 .. I get up and head downstairs. I use the loo then head for the kitchen. A quick weight check .. I’m stuck at 13st 11lb .. so it seems.

I sort my breakfast and munch while the PC boots. There is an e-mail from the new occupant of room 805 in the hospital on the Dr_S_Club group .. I have to reply and congratulate another Supornista .. as a previous occupier of that room.

08.30 .. I really must get on .. so I head back upstairs .. cranking the heating up as I go.

08.45 .. I’m in that position with number 2 in place .. I’m short by 1.5" or there about’s .. but I’m amazed when it takes under 15 minutes to reach depth. It’s a similar story with number 3 and I’m sorted, cooked in under an hour ..

09.40 .. I’m cooked .. and I’m really following today’s try before you buy house buying programme. It’s coming from Shropshire .. and the properties are stunning .. and cheap compared to this part of Surrey.

09.45 .. I’m relaxing watching “try before you buy”, with number 3 still in place, it won’t hurt .. when I suddenly cough .. I’m not holding the dilator .. it shoots out down the bed and lands between my knees .. OK .. time to get up and clean up then.

On my way to the bathroom I sneeze and loose grip of number 3, it hits the floor with a crack .. it actually landed on the wooden separator between the bathroom and hall carpets .. and it’s got a little chip and tiny star crack .. oh bottom. I can feel the chip under my fingers .. I give it a quick clean and attack it with an emery board .. it feels a lot better. 

10.09 .. My Skype phone rings .. gosh what timing .. it’s Christine in Chonburi .. I tell her what I’ve done, she’s going to buy me an extra number 3 and bring it back in her handbag / hand luggage .. I’ll meet her at Heathrow and exchange money for dilator on Friday 21st. She has a giggle when I tell her about coughing and firing the projectile .. lucky it came out blunt end first and my legs were out straight. Christine is amused considering what one might tell A&E about any resultant injury if it had hit something hard enough .. LOL.

10.50 .. Well talking to Christine has blown another 40 minutes, happily .. << smiles >> .. but I need to do my clean up, shower and cream routine.

11.50 .. I’m finally downstairs .. dressed ready to go out about 12.50.

12.20 .. Time for a very early lunch .. it’s a coronation chicken granery torpedo roll, an apple, a banana and a glass of orange juice.

12.55 .. I head for the bank in Sunningdale to get the balance I need .. WOW .. that’s a nice surprise .. I can afford to pay our accountant .. << grimace >>. I head up the A30 to Tesco’s and my mammogram appointment.

13.29 .. I walk from the car to the mobile mammogram unit, the sign by the entrance says .. closed. What do I do ? .. I go up the steps, get half way and the door opens .. a “technician/nurse” is holding the open sign .. she nips out and covers the closed sign.

I have to check a form and read a sheet of “let us know if any apply” .. number 4 does .. I’m on HRT. Oh and my PTC form still shows the wrong birth date .. 19th March and not the 17th .. the girl doing the form filling says only your GP can change that .. many have tried in the last 22 years .. still the North Surrey PCT insists I was born on the 19th.

I’m led through to the x-ray room / torture chamber .. the process is explained to me .. each breast has to be gripped twice, once in each plain. I have to remove my top and bra. The machine does grip too .. the horizontal grip is very uncomfortable .. the vertical grip almost brings a tear to my eye on the right side. Question is, if your going to create a device the patient has to put her arm around / across, do you design in nice smooth rounded edges .. like hell you do, you make right angle pointy bits of frame so that sticks into your armpit .. lovely, why make the pain any less.

13.45 .. I’ve got dressed in the fourth little room and I leave. I walk past Tesco’s and head into M&S. Well well, there’s the end of a sale on in the lingerie department, in fact “final reductions” through out the store .. I pick up some cheap bra’s to replace a couple of my worn out ones.

14.30 .. I’m back in the car .. I try to ring Julie again, as I’ll be passing close to there home on my return .. she’s still not in. I head for home ..

14.55 .. I am home .. I have a few things to do .. like call the solicitor’s secretary to see what’s going on. Seems mine isn’t the first phone call today complaining about the time it’s taking to get things sorted .. she’ll call me back as soon as she can lever the file out of the solicitor .. apparently he’s working on it .. hmmmm .. smell something again !!!

15.45 .. I call Karen again and get through .. I tell her about the bargains to be had at M&S.

16.00 .. Sarah B pops up for a chat on Yahoo messenger .. we chat about a few things ..

16.30 .. Sarah B has to go .. so I continue with the diary ..

17.28 .. Karen is home .. but she hasn’t been via M&S .. she’s been to Longacres. I had put the kettle on when I saw here arrive, so she makes the tea ..

18.50 .. Dinner is served .. sausages, beans and designer mash .. pudding is a fresh mango .. a little two fresh .. shared between us. 

19.16 .. Back to the PC, I find a Yahoo box open from “Raphaela” in Switzerland, from close to the german area town where I did some training years ago .. she’s another prospective Dr Suporn patient .. wanting some answers from me about things with Dr Suporn.

We chat for ages, her English is pretty good. We start a photo sharing session which only seems to work one way, so I end up scouring my diary for photo links to show her snaps of me. She’s obviously for real, and had found me through the Dr_S_Club group .. I persuade her she should join the SRSinThailand group .. for some more open answers than she’ll get from the other. She applies straight away, and as moderator, I accept her request.

We chat about a few things, including our partners .. it seems her partner is also coming to terms with the prospect of her transition too.

21.01 .. “Raphaela” and I have to say goodbye .. I need to go and do a dilation .. Karen brings me a cup of tea .. ahhh .. lovely ..

21.15 .. I head upstairs ..

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ...

00.20 .. I’m in bed ..

07.00 .. Karen wakes me up as she brings the tea in .. I’m thirsty .. my water glass is still full so clearly I had another good night .. << smiles >>.

07.35 .. I’m out of bed .. I head down to the loo and then the kitchen.

07.50 .. I boot my PC and munch my breakfast as I check my e-mails .. I log into Yahoo & Yahoo messenger. In my e-mails there is an application for membership to SRSinThailand .. the person applying hasn’t got a picture on her profile ..so I send her an email .. copying in the moderators .. asking for a photo ..

08.18 .. Tina pops up a Yahoo messenger box .. we chat about things like Tina not insisting on members photographs before joining SRSinThailand .. I think lowering standards is a mistake. She and Lori are starting yet another group, this time for post ops only, “THE POST -OP TRANSGENDERED GIRLS CLUB” .. I can see that being detrimental to SRSinThailand .. but ho hum. With the last two words in that group name I can see a pattern forming. I personally wouldn’t use a name that is a constant reminder, of a label that most “post ops” want to loose .. but ho hum.

08.50 .. I say goodbye .. I need to go dilate. I’m expecting a delivery, so I put my little sign in the letter box of the front door ..

09.30 .. I’m in that position .. it takes 30 minutes to get to depth again .. yesterday was obviously a freak !!!

10.50 .. I’m cooked ..

11.00 .. I’m in the bathroom .. toilet, shower ..

11.30 .. I’m back on the spare bed for the creaming .. it’s so nice to finish that last stage and be all comfy for another 10 hours ..

11.55 .. Solicitors secretary calls back ..

12.16 .. My sister calls .. looks like the American’s visit down to them with us will have to be re-arranged .. she and Robert worked out she’d be kitchen less that week .. oop’s ..

12.25 .. I’m all sorted .. dressed and head down stairs ..

12.55 .. Lunch .. another coronation chicken torpedo roll .. an apple, a banana and a plain chocolate Kit Kat .. a large glass of Orange juice washes it down.

14.05 .. I head off to say goodbye to my GP .. well I got 200 yds and turn back .. something I need to do.

14.25 .. I set off again .. but unfortunately I went to the wrong church hall .. LOL .. the one closest to the doctors surgery in Lightwater. So it could only be in one other place ..  

14.40 .. I walk up the path to the other place, there is an army coming the other way .. I’m wondering if this is the correct place or it’s all over 20 minutes earlier. Once inside the place is packed .. I deposit the “party bag” with a bottle of my very special 1999 Haut Medoc on a table swimming in gifts. I spot the doctor .. and go join the queue to shake his hand .. he’s been doing this for over an hour already ..

15.00 .. I head for Linda’s via a cruise of Chertsey to see if I can find a computer shop .. I fail.

15.35 .. I’m at Linda’s . .time for a cup of tea, a biscuit and a chat.

16.10 .. Linda has work to do .. so I depart.

16.25 .. I’m home .. Karen will be home soon so I better get the washing up done.

16.45 .. Karen arrives home .. ..

19.05 .. Dinner is served .. Shepard’s pie with honey roast carrots .. a couple of slices of not so good Tesco’s melon serves at dessert.

19.33 .. Michelle pops up a Yahoo message box .. we chat for quite a while .. she’s been trying to get me information on the illusive “Baygon Ant Killer”.

20.08 .. I found a bit of paper earlier from my last night in Thailand .. it has the e-mail address and Yahoo ID of Kathie, Vanessa’s friend .. so I pop her a Yahoo message as she was shown on line on her profile .. I suspect Yahoo was showing it wrong, as it does. I send her an email just in case she doesn’t use messenger.

20.23 .. Michelle has to go ..

21.07 .. Karen’s making some tea from the sound of it .. so I’ll end here for now .. I’ve really got to go do the drudgery.

More to come ...

23.58 .. I’m in bed .. I slept reasonably well to start with.

05.45 .. I don’t know what woke me up, but I’m thirsty, and drink half my water in one go.

06.58 .. Karen wakes me up as she delivers the tea.

07.25 .. I get up and head downstairs.

Sorted in the loo .. I do a quick weight check .. 13st 9 1/4lb .. YES, YEs, Yes, yes .. sorry.

09.30 .. I’m in that position .. and a long way off “my depth”.

10.02 .. Christine calls from Thailand on Skype .. we chat for a while .. she’s got me the spare 34mm dilator to replace my damaged number 3 .. we’ll meet at Heathrow next Friday evening when she lands.

11.20 .. There’s a knock at the front door, luckily I’ve just finished the cleanup, so I don my dressing gown and head downstairs. It’s my delivery of DVD blanks, on the carpet amongst the ordinary post is a jiffy bag .. that’ll be the loom adaptor I ordered for the Cavaliers radio.

I have a chat with Tina on Yahoo .. she asks me to be a moderator on her new post op group .. I accept.

12.30 .. I call the bank which I’ve applied to open a new business account with .. I’m promised a call back.

12.50 .. Lunch .. a ham sandwich, an apple and a plain chocolate Kit Kat .. washed down with orange juice.

13.45 .. I’m in the drive sitting in my car extracting the radio .. easier said than done. The old one just won’t pop out as it should .. Steve and I have removed countless radio’s from Peugeot’s, and this is clearly the same release mechanism as the early cars we did.

14.03 .. I’m still struggling to get the old radio released when the phone rings .. it’s the new bank finally returning my call from earlier .. I’ve now got an appointment for next Tuesday in Camberley to sort that out. Then a delivery van pulls up .. new catalogues for Farnell’s have arrived .. and it’s the usual duplication .. grrrrr.

The radio suddenly starts to move then pops out .. damned .. I didn’t need the ruddy loom adaptor .. this is clearly a later model Cavalier, it already has ISO connectors.

It’s raining lovely .. I have to get an aerial connector from my component store ..I have a few in stock. The Cavalier has a different type of aerial connector held in the din chassis .. it’s not a standard old fashioned connector.

15.45 .. I give up .. the new radio is obviously faulty .. the CD works fine but the radio is just “static”.

16.25 .. Karen arrives home .. she makes a cup of tea, to wash down a hot cross bun.

16.55 .. I finally do the washing up ..

I contact Ebuyer to sort out returning the duff car radio .. after making contact through the website I have to follow it up with a call .. but dinner is served .. so the phone goes to the table in speaker mode ..

19.10 .. Dinner is served .. Lasagne .. eaten with phone call punctuation. I’m asked a couple of technical questions .. he’s treating me as female I am sure .. suddenly he changes his tune, I wonder if he’s spotted my studio e-mail address they have as a reference “fitting car radio’s to you is easy isn’t it” .. “yes” I reply. He approves my returns number so I can return the unit. Pudding is sticky toffee pudding with a little ice cream .. sorry scales.

Back to the Ebuyer site .. the next cheapest option is to get a DVD capable player .. thinks .. in a couple of years this could be transplanted onto a boat .. << smiles >>.

21.30 .. I better go do a drudgery .. well that was my thought at the moment .. but I need to tidy up a few things ..

However .. Karen wasn’t feeling to well and decided to go to bed early .. so I didn’t get started for a while.

22.22 .. I’m in that position, and I decide to try a short cut as suggested by Christine. Well it did save some time ..

00.02 .. I’m finally in bed.

Completed 14th March.

Memory Joggers ...

Well I didn’t have a good night, I was in quite a lot of discomfort and I couldn’t find a sweet spot to get comfortable, wedge or not. I sipped most of my water away by the time my tea arrived.

06.10 .. I get up and go to the loo, just in case internal pressure is adding to my discomfort .. it wasn’t.

06.58 .. Karen returns with the tea, I was awake.

07.35 .. I get up and head down stairs. After the trip to the loo I go boot the PC ahead of the kitchen routine.

In the kitchen I do a quick weight check .. 13st 9 1/4 lb .. still .. phew. Breakfast is consumed in front of the computer.

08.52 .. I give Bob a call, as expected he’s on the boat, which at the moment has a provisional launch date of next Wednesday .. the one day I can’t manage to get down for.

10.20 .. Well I’m in that position .. and I’m not too comfortable. I’m not sure if it was last night’s short cut that caused me to be uncomfortable overnight and now, but uncomfortable I am. It takes 35 minutes to get to depth with number 2, and like last night, after 5 minutes at depth with number 2 I switch to number 3.

It takes nearly 15 minutes to get to depth with number 3 .. the longest time yet.

11.40 .. I’m cooked .. I head for the shower. I sort myself out, cream and dress in my undies, I return to the bathroom to wash and condition my hair. Double wash and then conditioner done, I head downstairs in my undies to dry my off enough.

12.45 .. I’m fully sorted, dressed .. and ready to go.

12.52 .. I give Tony a call, as we had a loose arrangement for a possible lunch time drink, to include Bob if he’d been around. Well Bob clearly isn’t .. I call Tony’s mobile .. no answer.

13.05 .. I call Tony’s home number and Judith answers .. she’s very pleasant and asks how I feel now everything is sorted .. “different but normal”. Tony is working today, but last Friday he was expecting to be off .. guess he’s been called to do an extra day and forgotten about our arrangement .. never mind.

Well .. I need to sort myself some lunch, as lunch out is off .. a ham sandwich, an apple and a plain chocolate Kit Kat, washed down with orange juice .. am I repeating myself ..LOL.

13.20 .. I return to the PC with lunch and find a Yahoo messenger box opened by Michelle in Australia .. apart from exchanging pleasantries, we don’t get any further .. hmmm.

13.30 .. I pop a message to Linda on Yahoo .. I need to return a few things to her .. so we agree that I’ll go round in about 30 minutes or so.  

I call our VAT office to see how I go about changing some names on a VAT account .. yep .. download 3 different forms from their website and fill them in .. great.

14.00 .. I leave for Linda’s .. leaving the birthday card for my oldest mate Steve behind .. doh .. it’s our birthday’s on Monday .. but I’m the youngest one by a few hours .. LOL .. an old g** he is .. << grins >>.

14.15 .. I’m at Linda’s .. we soon settle down for a cup of tea and an apple pie .. lovely. Post tea, I follow her down to her studio to try and sort a little problem out with a KVM .. sadly the KVM looks duff .. it only switches video now, it seems to have lost the keyboard and mouse.

15.15 .. I leave Linda’s and head for Staines .. I need to give our accountant a cheque for one of my businesses accounts .. shame it’s had to come out of my pocket for the short term. I choose to go the slightly long way round by going down two junctions on the M25 .. Chertsey to Staines .. is this Friday afternoon .. yes definitely .. the traffic is hell.

15.30 .. I’m in Staines at my accountants office .. I go in to drop the cheque off and end up talking to David for a while .. he wants to know how it’s all going .. Thailand and transition generally. David has some advice for us on options to handle the ltd company of ours .. though we know what we need to do.

15.45 .. I leave my accountants office and head for PC World in Staines seeking a SCSI2 cable .. another blank .. I need a proper computer shop.

16.05 .. I head for home .. the traffic on the A30 past Egham to Sunningdale is building up .. so I cut across from the A30 lights down through Wentworth past “Jennifer’s” house and onto Chobham Common and onwards to home.

16.28 .. I’m home .. first job is to walk down to the post office in the village to post Steve’s birthday card to make sure he gets it on Monday.

16.50 .. I’m back .. Karen makes me a cup off tea to wash a hot cross bun down ..

18.55 .. Dinner part 1 .. chicken and sweetcorn soup .. helped down with some of that lovely “Karen’s School” granary bread. 

19.28 .. Dinner part two is half a pizza with some oven chips, peppers and tomatoes.

19.45 .. Dessert, for moi, is the remains of the melon eaten in front of the TV in the lounge watching sport relief. Back to the PC to do some diary stuff.

21.05 .. Karen’s made the tea .. I need to go and drink it then head up for the drudgery ..

22.20 .. Hmmm .. I’m finally in that position and catch the last part of the news before Sports Relief restarts .. did I dose off at one point with number 3 .. maybe.

23.50 .. I’m cooked .. 

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ...

00.35 .. I’m finally in bed ..

I didn’t sleep too well again, and had sipped most of my water away by the morning.

08.25 .. I get up and use the loo .. just as Karen returns with the tea. Post loo .. I go down and do the official Saturday morning weigh in .. 13st 9 3/4lb .. I’m happy with that given the calories in last nights dinner. I return to bed for my tea and a little cuddle. Karen wants to get up and get out “you want a birthday present don’t you?” when I moan about being short changed.

09.35 .. I’m in the kitchen .. tablets and breakfast. I munch my breakfast at the PC checking my e-mails .. the mistake was going visible on Yahoo. An old TV friend who lives in Sunningdale pops up for a chat .. so we do.

There’s some unrest in the ranks of SRSinThailand about Tina’s idea of setting up a group exclusively for post ops .. one I’ll have to answer as it’s clearly an attack on divisionist post ops .. and I’m definitely not one ..

11.15 .. I’m finally in that position .. it takes 35 minutes again to get to depth .. I do just 5 minutes “quality time with number 2 before switching to number 3 .. over 10 minutes to reach depth .. 15 minutes quality time.

12.25 .. I’m cooked .. I head for the shower ..

13.10 .. I’m down stairs all sorted and dressed .. I give Karen a call to see if she’s still in Camberley .. she isn’t . from the noise I suspect she’s at her sisters.

14.20 .. I’m getting hungry .. still no sign of Karen .. I better go make myself some lunch.

Lunch was .. a ham sandich in “school bread” .. lovely .. a slice of that bread with honey on it .. fantastic .. an apple, the last dark chocolate Kit Kat and some orange juice.

14.50 .. Having watched the TV coverage of the Australian F1 qualifying .. I’d better go and do the washing up ..

15.25 .. Still no sign of Karen .. think I’ll rebuild my computer corner .. out with the old server .. I’ll have to replace that for the time being using the old main PC .. I need the SCSI subsystem for a while to run my scanner.

16.25 .. Karen is home, she’s been to Mandy’s and shopping in Guildford .. hmmmm ..

16.55 .. Off to my mums .. 

17.15 .. We are in my mums ..

19.10 .. Time to head home, via petrol in Egham, and a Chinese from Bagshot ..

19.50 .. Finally we are home .. time to eat ..

20.15 .. The food is over .. now where was I .. oh yes as if I can forget .. rebuilding the computer corner ..

21.40 .. The computer corner seems to be back together .. I boot the main PC to make sure it does .. phew.

22.05 .. I better go do a drudgery .. but as I leave the lounge we have a tender moment .. gosh that was nice ..

22.30 .. I’m in that position ..

00.30 .. I’m back on the spare bed and I’ve finished the “creaming” .. but there is a cracking suspense film on TV ..

01.10 .. I head to bed .. via the lounge to turn the heating down and the kitchen to collect my water.

More to come .. maybe..

Memory Joggers ...

01.12 .. I’m in bed .. it takes a long while to get comfortable and I don’t sleep well.

It was a rough nite, I don’t know why .. the birds woke me up at 05.30 .. by which time my water glass was nearly empty.

09.03 .. Karen brings the tea in .. I need the loo and make it so. After a while Karen snuggles up for a cuddle .. I like to cuddle her as much, if not more .. as being cuddled by her.

09.45 .. Time to get up .. I head for the kitchen .. and eat my breakfast in front of the PC. I check my e-mails and work out where I need to go with my photo pages.

10.50 .. I’m in that position .. Karen heads off out to do some “shopping”.

12.20 .. I am cooked .. time to head for the shower ..

13.05 .. I’m sorted, dressed and down stairs .. back to the PC. I want to start showing some pictures of friends in my Thailand photo section .. so I e-mail a picture to Rosalyn and Tina in Canada of them outside the Chinese temple .. asking permission to post it.

Karen returns home .. I don’t rush to find out what the shopping is .. I guess I’ll discover that tomorrow.

13.40 .. Lunch is served .. a ham sandwich .. some crisps and some olives. A slice of bread with honey on is a good cake substitute .. but Karen delivers a secret weapon .. two M&S strawberry tarts .. but they aren't as good as Waitrose ones.

14.20 .. I’m in Waitrose ..

15.10 .. I’m home, via a trip to the bank to raid the cash machine.

17.40 .. Ray, Karen’s dad arrives bearing a card and a wrapped bottle .. the shape is the give away .. for my birthday tomorrow.

17.50 .. Karen’s dad leaves, we’re going to go out with him and Chris after Easter when it’s quiet again .. as we close the door Karen is sobbing .. thoughts of her mum who died 25 years ago .. next Saturday would have been her dad and mums 50th wedding anniversary.  I give her a standing cuddle to comfort her, I know that she misses her mum still, she was a lovely woman, one has to wonder if she’d knocked some sense into the rest of the family ( Karens younger sister and elder of two younger brothers ) about me now, or been anti .. I like to think she would have been supportive, she was a kind person really.

18.50 .. Dinner is served .. it’s pasta .. Tagliatelle .. in a spicy vegetable sauce with slices of sausage in it. Pudding was a small bowl of Waitrose ginger and chocolate vanilla ice cream .. lovely .. but the ginger was a hot surprise in something so cold .. LOL.

19.20 .. Post dinner I do some more pages in my Thailand photo section .. I’ve got to a point not quite half way through Day 20, I need the OK from some friends really before I post there pictures.

20.30 .. Karen brings me a cup of tea.

21.00 .. I’m heading upstairs to do the drudgery.

Karen asked earlier about my help changing our bed .. it’s not been done yet, so I call her up and we do it together.

22.10 .. I’m finally in that position ..

More to come ..

00.20 .. I’m finally in bed .. and it’s another rough night sleep wise.

05.50 .. I’m awake and thirsty .. my water glass is almost empty at this point.

06.45 .. Karen gets up, after a comfort break she heads down stairs .. I get up to use the loo.

07.00 .. I return to the bedroom, there’s a large vase with three different bunches of flowers rammed in for me to arrange later .. some cards and a bag of other pressies .. oh and a cup of tea.

I open the presents .. a pretty photo frame ( analogue .. LOL), a “shoe bag” ( which my mum can duplicate ), a horizontal stripped T shirt to make my breasts look bigger, a tub of exotic fruit skin cream for my legs .. some chocolates and some nuts. There was also a coaster .. of the humourous variety, picturing an elegant woman holding a wine bottle with a top caption .. “Take my advice and never drink water” .. at the bottom it continues “I’ve seen what it does to the bottom of boats” .. LOL .. would have been a good one for BOB too. She’s given me two birthday cards .. one I’ll have to scan and put here.

Well this is the first card Karen gave me .. thanks .. I love her too !!!!






















Well here you go ..  two very similar cards .. Roberts (which arrived in this mornings post) on the left, Karen's on the right .. do they know me or what .. hang on a minute, I haven't got many bags .. I tend to use one till it falls apart then buy another ..  hmmmm.













 








After a brief cuddle Karen gets up to get ready for work.

07.35 .. I get up and head downstairs. I do a quick loo stop, and I’m worried things aren’t moving.

I do a quick weight check before my breakfast .. 13st 11 3/4lb .. it’s been a heavy weekend and I feel bloated. I boot the PC and have my breakfast reading my e-mails and other birthday cards .. the one from my mum is a “Daughter” card .. << smiles >>.

08.00 .. Karen heads off for work ..

I spot Audrey in the USA is visible on Yahoo, it’s been a couple of weeks I think .. but I think she must be asleep, hopefully she’ll answer me later.

08.55 .. I was just about to go upstairs and do the dilation, when my Skype phone rings .. it’s Christine the display tells me. But I can’t hear her, later she says she could hear me a bit.

09.03 .. After several failed attempts with Christine calling my Phillips Skype phone, I start my PC version up on my other account and we chat there for a while on web cam, I must say she’s looking a lot better now, in that some of the swelling and bruising has subsided. We chat about a few things, including the Suporn Clinic’s inability to get me the information I need on the insecticide .. the feeling is they just want to bury it and me.

After a while there is a knock on her hotel room door .. it’s a couple of girls from the clinic .. one of whom is Jib !! Jib picks up Christine’s headphones and we have a short chat too, she seems happy to see me and I show her the room here on cam. However, the girls are there for a reason .. to check up on Christine and do her a breast massage .. part of the cost of augmentation .. LOL. I say goodbye to Jib promising to send her a photograph of her and her boyfriend I took as I left Thailand at the airport.

I head upstairs .. as I walk up the stairs I suddenly break wind .. I run for the loo .. relief at last. Before I start the dilation .. I send my oldest mate, Steve, a happy birthday text message .. he replies with the same.

09.50 .. I’m finally in that position .. but it takes me 40 minutes to get to depth with number 2 .. oo er .. then 15 minutes to get depth with number 3.

11.20 .. I’m cooked .. so I get up and go to the loo again .. dilation does stimulate the body motions .. well depending on tonight’s meal out with Karen the scales should look better tomorrow. I head down briefly to see if anybody ( Christine ).

I head downstairs briefly before showering .. it was a good move. I picked up the post and found a birthday card from my son, Robert .. that means a lot, first one in three years. It says dad inside, well I still am I know that, but it’s a nice girly card, similar to one of Karen’s.

I’m just about to return upstairs when there is a knock at the front door .. it’s a delivery driver with the replacement car radio / CD / DVD .. I’ll have to go give that a try later.

13.02 .. I’m back downstairs .. time for lunch .. a spicy chicken sandwich filler wholemeal roll, an apple and a banana .. washed down with some orange juice.

14.33 .. I restart my PC Skype, and give Christine another call .. I’ve caught her preparing for bed .. she gives me a quick flash of herself on camera with her pressure dressing on .. scarey .. LOL.

15.00 .. There’s a knock at the front door .. It’s Julie, John, who suffered a stroke 6 months ago is sitting in the car .. we chat for a while on the door step .. she hands me a pressie and a card. I was in two minds to go out and try to talk to John, but I know he has pretty severe communication difficulties .. Julie says he’s finding it hard, and has already just put me off going round to see him during the day.

15.25 .. I go out to the drive .. new car radio in hand. I have to fish in the dashboard to retrieve the aerial .. I connect it up .. the radio works .. yippee. Then I put a CD in it .. the first track starts to play great .. I advance it on to track 2 .. great .. track four .. silence .. this is a good immaculate CD. Try track one again .. nothing .. grrrrrr. At this moment Karen arrives home ..

16.20 .. Karen is home .. dejectedly I follow her in, another duff cd radio to return to Ebuyer.

Karen makes a cup of tea, served with a hot cross bun .. she spots the card from Robert and giggles, it’s so similar with a selection of little handbags stuck on the front .. she giggles and says they think alike .. hmmmm .. I giggle self consciously.

We discuss what we are going to do to eat tonight .. looks like a Chinese near Ascot.

17.00 .. Having caught up with the diary .. I need to go and wash my hair.

19.22 .. We are finally in the car heading for Hyn’s in South Ascot .. it’s less than a ten minutes drive for us. Shame we are in the Jazz though, one of the roads across to South Ascot from here is terribly bumpy .. and my doughnut cushion can’t cope .. ouch !!

19.30 .. We are in the restaurant, being a Monday it’s not very busy, but being Ascot, and this not being the cheapest Chinese restaurant around, the other diners are fairly well healed. We are shown to a table for two, I guess they are running at about 25% capacity tonight.

We haven’t been here since I started my transition .. but something I think we’ll have to do more often. The food here is good, the service is very nice and they will do customisation’s on the menu for us .. we go for the “Chef’s Recommended Set Menu” at £23.50 a head .. but with the fishy items replaced by non fishy substitutes.

The food was good, as we eat, we are listening to one rather loud posser, clearly a race horse owner, talking about horses, trainers and racing in general .. he’s alone tonight cause his wife has gone of to the Carribean for two weeks, then in a month they are spending a fortnight in Miami .. it’s all right for some.

Karen and I chat about a few things, including who we’ve been here with in the past .. I we’ve been here loads of times in the 22 plus years we’ve lived here.

21.30 .. Karen settles the bill .. £60 including two glasses of lemonade and a cocktail each .. mine was a Margarita, Karen’s was non alcoholic.

21.40 .. Taking a slightly longer route home to save my bottom .. we are home.

I nip upstairs to wash and things before coming back down stairs to check my e-mails and things ..

22.15 .. I’m in that position .. and it’s definitely getting harder .. or is it that I keep dosing off .. I’m sure that Margarita wasn’t that strong.

23.55 .. I’m cooked I think .. time to clean up and get to bed.    

Completed from memory and memory joggers Tuesday March 18th.

Memory Joggers ...

00.28 .. I finally get into bed .. putting the towel back on the bed just in case .. I noticed I was bleeding a little as I finished the clean up ..

Well I don’t sleep to well .. even when I’ve found a comfy “sweet spot” I can’t relax .. I’m worried about that little seep of blood from a patch of granulation just in front of my opening. The granulation has spread over the last couple of weeks and forms three little mounds now. The area of necrosis I had is all but gone, just the tiniest little sliver left now, again near to the entrance of the opening. The granulation is a bit of a worry.

06.58 .. Karen wakes me up as she brings a cup of tea in .. I need the loo .. so I make it so.  

07.35 .. I get up and head downstairs. I did do a weight check, but the scales must be broken again after last nights fantastic meal .. I’ll have to check again tomorrow to see if they are working again.

Breakfast is consumed in front of the PC .. I check my e-mails .. I’ve got a nice reply from Rosalyn in Canada saying I can post the picture of her and Tina in my photo section, so I do a quick edit on Day 20 and upload it .. still another twelve pictures to load, I need to ask Laura and Micheline for there permission too.

09.15 .. Having sorted myself in the bathroom, I remembered I hadn’t taken a couple of medications .. so I do, and check on the PC .. fatal .. there’s a message box up from a Turkish male chaser, Jack, he’s a really pleasant guy and has chatted to me a few times about all sorts .. bang goes 20 minutes .. and while I’m here I might as well finish yesterday’s birthday diary write up .. bang goes another 20 minutes .. the post arrives .. 4 late birthday cards .. including one made by Claire .. clearly the person who helped her doesn’t know how her version of the name is spelt .. “from Clare” .. grrrr. Interestingly, all 4 postmarks are smudged. This is a deliberate ploy I am sure by the post office so that people can’t see when items are posted .. all had first class stamps on, one, from my sister I’m sure says the 15th .. next day delivery .. NO !!.

10.25 .. I finally head upstairs to do the dilation .. via another loo stop and a quick pre dilation wash to wake me up.

10.45 .. I’m in that position .. 45 minutes to get to depth with number 2 .. aargh .. 15 with number 3 .. I think the “difficult stage” has landed with a bang.

12.25 .. I’m cooked .. gosh look at the time .. I really need to crack on.

13.05 .. I’m finally eating ,my lunch .. a large wholemeal ham roll, an apple and a banana.

13.25 .. I got to go .. but suddenly realise I didn’t sort my face when I did my legs and arms after my shower .. I head upstairs all ready to go out .. and loose another 5 minutes grooming my eyebrows and face. Gosh .. the skin on my face is getting so dry.

13.58 .. I’m in the bank in Camberley, and report to the enquiries desk .. they’ll summon the chap I need to see. I’m told to take a seat but I remain standing and watch the TV there.

14.05 .. I’m ushered into a little room with the chap who does business account startups. I thought most of the work had been done on line .. a simple recall and mail merge maybe .. NOPE. The forms need filling in from scratch, though he has a print out of what I’d done on line .. on another computer screen .. so the “pop in sign a couple of forms and show your ID” turns into a 55 minute ordeal that has me worring about my car in a 30 minute bay.

15.05 .. I’m back at the car .. phew .. no ticket, just hope it’s not done by remote control from a camera 50 yds away on a corner .. specially as I’m the closest car with my plate visible. I move the car 200 yds round the corner to a different parking area and park again. Actually this is a good place .. right on the end of an alley way that links the A30 into the Meadows shopping centre.
 
So off I go, I’m a third of the way down the alley when a group of “lads” enters at the far end .. we pass each other without an issue .. I was worried for a moment. First stop is Boots, for a supply of night time pads .. and the single packs are on special offer .. buy two cheaper than buying a twin pack .. so I take 4 single packs. I get some more of the fizzy orange vitamin b/c drink I’ve been taking for the last couple of weeks ..

Next stop is a card shop, Easter is coming .. I get a card for Karen. While browsing one I find a “Happy Easter from the Dog” card .. it’s cheap, so I get it to send on behalf of my sisters 4 mutts. Next stop is the Thornton’s shop .. I’ll say no more. Final stop is Holland and Barrett’s opposite, they’ve got another mega sale .. and two of the supplements I take are on offer .. sorted .. 3 months supply of Flaxseed oil and a years supply of Gingko Biloba .. that one was reduced from £26 a 120 pot to £6 !!!   

15.55 .. I’m back in the car .. the new street layout in Camberley is a pain, but I’m able to do a 3 point turn and find a relatively quick cut back onto the A30 eastwards.

16.10 .. I’m home .. I take a few things upstairs. Knowing Karen will be home soon I fill the kettle and switch it on.

16.25 .. Karen arrives home too .. She’s carrying some flowers .. she bought them for a friend she was supposed to be seeing tonight, but she got a message a short while ago that her outing tonight is off .. so it’s dinner for two here then. Karen makes a cup of tea to wash down a hot cross bun.

I do some scanning and picture taking of my cards from yesterday, get the size I want and paste them into yesterday’s diary ..

18.50 .. Dinner is served .. it’s an M&S “Italian woodfired ham & mozzarella calzone pizza” with a salad .. a few olives thrown in for good luck. Pudding is a small portion of Ben & Jerry’s cookie dough ice cream.

19.20 .. Dinner is over. I check my e-mails and add a little to the diary.

20.10 .. Karen’s made a cup of tea, I go perch near her and share some Green & Blacks “Organic selection” chocolates. These, a pressie from John & Julie yesterday, are like our chocolate club selections .. two of everything .. ideal for sharing.

20.50 .. That time is looming .. I upload the diary so far and prepare for the drudgery .. but I remember I’ve forgotten something ..

21.50 .. After doing an e-mail to Laura and Micheline .. I finally go upstairs ..

22.40 .. I’m finally in that position .. amazingly it only took 15 minutes to get to depth with number 2 ..

23.30 .. I can’t believe it .. I’m cooked .. what’s gone wrong .. !!!

00.10 .. I’m in bed ..

More to come ...

Well .. after that happy dilation last night .. if a dilation could be happy .. I slept pretty well. I wedged myself and got comfy pretty quick, I’m still pretty tired from the series of bad nights .. so maybe that helped ..

06.45 .. I wake up with Karen’s alarm .. I’m thirsty .. and drink half of my untouched water. I switch the TV on for the news.

07.22 .. I get up and head for the downstairs loo .. relief .. luxury. However in the kitchen the scales are telling me they are still broken .. 13st 12lb can’t be correct surely !!! .. well we have had a few big meals recently. I eat my breakfast in front of the PC .. checking my e-mails.

08.09 .. I ring my doctors to make an appointment .. I’m number 13 in the queue on this 0844 phone number .. it takes 6 minutes to get through to the receptionist. I’m offered a 16.00 appointment with my new lady GP .. ideal if she’s running on time.

08.25 .. I head upstairs to prep for the drudgery .. everything to hand to make a phone call at 10.00 if I have to do it laying down.

08.40 .. I’m in that position .. it’s a repeat of last nights session .. so what was yesterday mornings horrendous session all about !!

09.30 .. I am cooked .. so I head for a quick clean, shower and cream session .. time gets tight and I end up rushing down to do the engineering call in my undies, dressing gown in hand for some warmth.

10.00 .. I’m downstairs in the lounge .. I use the company mobile to dial into the engineering conference call ..

11.25 .. The engineering conference call comes to an end ..

11.45 .. I boot the company laptop that hasn’t been used for 11 weeks .. a shed load of updating to do before I log into the company network ..

12.30 .. It’s taken 2 re-boots already and it’s still updating ..

12.40 .. I’m still in my dressing gown, but I’m hungry .. so I get my lunch. It’s a ham wholemeal roll, an apple, a banana, a Kellogg’s special K 90cal orange and chocolate bar .. delicious .. a glass of orange juice washes it all down.

Post lunch .. I do some more work on my day 20 photo section .. and then pop my head into the Trans-mission chat room .. my profile needs updating .. another year to add.

14.20 .. I guess I should do something useful ..

I pop Audrey in the USA a Yahoo messenger question asking permission to use a picture of her in my diary .. she replies .. I can .. so it’s done, just need to hear back from Laura and Micheline.

15.20 .. I’ve finished day 20 of my photo section, all but one picture .. I need permission for that one.

I head upstairs to freshen up before going to the doctors. However, as I know she wants to do an “intimate” inspection, I do a quick “shower and clean below the waist”.

15.52 .. I head off in the car for my doctors .. there’s a holdup in the village .. lorries should be banned from here.

16.00 .. I’m in my doctors waiting room ..

16.10 .. My new doctor calls me through. Well the blood test results show I’ve bounced back from the extreme anaemia I was showing in the blood tests done in Pattaya, Thailand, my blood looks normal from that point. It’s good news on the Testosterone level to .. 0.7 .. which is really good, but then I have to ask why I’ve had this sudden unladylike hair growth .. hmmm. 

Time for an inspection. This doctors room is tiny, the gap between the curtain and the couch is not enough for me to stand side ways on to bare myself. The doctor has a look .. she thinks it’s really very neat and asks how Dr Suporn created it and from what skin. I explain the best I can from the facts I know.

Examination over, she gives me a prescription for Movicol and another to attempt to get a supply of Betadine again, I need to shop around, she insists it’s available. She asks me if I need anything else .. I say no .. this will come back to bite me on the bum tomorrow.

16.30 .. I’m in the Lloyds chemist .. the pharmacist makes a call to her supplier again .. it’s the same reply not available. I walk across the road to Macdonald’s Pharmacy. Mr Macdonald calls his supplier .. happens to be the same one as Lloyds use apparently .. but using his knowledge he asks for a different brand .. success .. it’ll be here tomorrow .. well, well, well. Maybe I should bring all my business here, but the staff in Lloyds really are very friendly towards me.

17.15 .. I’m finally home after all the chemist hassles .. and it’s really too late to try and fit a dilation in now. Karen makes a cup of tea .. I slice off two slices from my little birthday cake. I head for the PC .. make a few notes and check my e-mails. On the company laptop I set to deleting some of the 3400 e-mails that are unread in my mail box.

40 minutes later .. I’ve reduced the 3400 down to 650 .. I’ll have to sort those out too sometime.

18.30 .. I head upstairs to freshen up ..

19.05 .. I head for the pub meal near Reading .. to meet up with a crowd of friends and acquaintances .. but just about everything goes wrong. I stop for petrol in Bracknell, the Shell garage has only a few pumps running, so it’s join a queue.

19.25 .. Back on the road, trying to pick up the pace, all is going well till I join th M4 at J10 and grind to a halt .. it’s a traffic jam. This is caused by a football match with people queuing to leave at J11 .. it takes nearly 20 minutes to go 5 miles.

20.05 .. I’m in the pub, I was worried about getting there so late, but many others have been caught too .. with another half dozen arriving after me. It’s a good turn out with a lot of familiar faces, including Marion who was blinded in an accident a few years ago and she’s bought a blind friend too.

Gabby and I chat a lot during the evening, sitting together in the bar and restaurant. We are comparing notes, she’s 5 months ahead of me though with an English surgeon .. so direct comparisons aren’t totally valid. Sitting opposite Gabby for the meal is a girl I still remember as Gill .. sorry, I know you’ll read this so e-mail me and remind me of your legal name now .. she’s having her surgery with the same guy as Gabby, this summer. So she’s joining in the conversation too, I’ve known her for a long while too, we first met at Cherry’s house meetings in Reading years ago, long before she came out as TS too. I tell Gabby about the neat little “Muslim showers” in the toilets in Thailand .. I want to fit one .. and she’s interested too .. I promise to send her some links.

The food has definitely been improved considerably in this pub, and I can confirm I’ve had no ill effect from eating here .. something that I couldn’t always say last year at this venue. The food was good, a starter (“home made” breaded brie wedge), a main course ( chicken breast on a bed of “crushed” potatoes with a cream and mushroom sauce and baby carrots )  and a coffee came to £16.00 .. meeting and chatting with friends .. priceless. For the TS’s .. this gathering is just meeting friends .. for the CD/TG’s there this is there escape, and we all mix together happily.

22.00 .. I coffee’s haven’t been delivered yet and the time is getting on .. I’m not looking forward to the dilation that is late now. Coffee arrives and as soon as it’s done I find Lorraine the organiser .. she’s done the maths .. so I pay my debt and get ready to leave, I think I’m almost the first to leave.

22.27 .. I finally leave and head for home .. I’m later than I hoped so it’s going to be a late night. The trip home is event free except a couple of miles coned down to one lane between J11 and J10 that slowed things down.

23.05 .. I’m home .. I quickly set to getting myself sorted.

23.15 .. I’m in the bathroom .. washing ready for bed and prepping for the drudgery.

23.35 .. I’m in that position .. 40 minutes to get to depth again with number 2 .. it’s not helped by the fact I’m struggling to stay awake and I’m tense as a result.
 
Completed from memory and memory joggers Thursday March 20th.

Memory Joggers ...

01.30 .. I’m finally in bed .. that was not a good dilation at all. I get comfortable fairly quickly, I’m tired, very tired .. I’m soon out.

07.02 .. I’m woken up as Karen brings a cup of tea in .. I’m really thirsty .. my water is untouched. I drink some tea .. ah lovely.

07.35 .. I haul myself out of bed and head downstairs. It’s the usual routine, I throw in a weight check . .13st 11lb .. the scales are feeling better .. << grimace >>. I go to do my tablets and supplements and discover that what I though yesterday was an untouched box of 84 tablets .. has 11 in it .. aargh .. I got a problem Houston !! I’ll have to sort a repeat prescription .. but tomorrow and Monday are bank holiday’s .. so it’ll be Tuesday or Wednesday ..

Breakfast is eaten in front of the computer.

09.20 .. I’m in that position .. it’s another difficult dilation, wish I could work out why I had those two good ones 24 hours ago or so.

10.50 .. I’m cooked .. well it could have been worse. I head for a shower.

11.50 .. I’m down stairs .. and I’ve got things to do.

12.30 .. My motorbike needs to be run for a while .. so I go out to the garage and start it .. it’s been about 2 weeks again I think. It doesn’t start well, but it does start .. so I leave it running while I go into eat ..

12.45 .. Lunch .. a large wholemeal roll with coronation chicken filling, an apple, a banana and a glass of orange juice.

13.10 .. I return to my bike .. it’s running nicely now .. and it’s got hot enough to bring the fan on .. no more condensation is coming from the exhaust so I switch it off and close the garage up.

I need to make a call, or two as it turns out, to sort out the return of both the car radio’s recently delivered to me, both faulty. Sounds easy .. so why do I get two different answers solutions from Ebuyer’s returns people. In the end it’s sorted, both machines in one box, and I sort a collection FOC on Tuesday.

16.05 .. I head off to Lightwater and Macdonald’s Pharmacy to collect the items he should have for me. I’m down at the main road waiting to turn right as Karen turns in .. I tell her what I’m up to. On the way I drop a repeat prescription form off at the doctors .. the receptionist confirms it’ll be Wednesday at the earliest.

16.40 .. I’m back home .. time for a cup of tea and a couple of slices of “hot cross loaf” that Karen has bought home.

I crack into some diary and emails .. including e-mailing Gabby with the links I promised her yesterday.

18.15 .. Dinner part 1 is served ..Chicken soup .. I do like chicken soup.

18.35 .. Dinner part 2 is served .. it’s a Karen Tagliatelle concoction .. with two types of preserved sausage, red peppers and mushrooms in a tomato mascarpone cheese sauce .. washed down with just a little red wine that was a birthday present from Ray .. it was really nice. For pudding, Karen and I share some dried mango and pineapple.

19.43 .. Lynn, an old friend, pops up for a chat on Yahoo, followed a few minutes later by a a stranger “Daphne” .. who has found me through one of the groups I’m in. We chat for a while, it’s clear the interests of Lynn and Daphne are closer matched .. I need to do a few things so I introduce the two to each other .. I get down to what I need to do .. everyone’s happy .. << smiles >>.

20.05 .. I say goodbye to Lynn and Daphne.

20.10 .. Karen makes a cup of tea .. we share some of my birthday chocolates.

21.00 .. The Jan Hamilton / Dr Suporn TV thing has been postponed till 22.00 .. so I set the DVD recorder up to record channel 4 from 21.58

21.20 .. I need to go and do a dilation .. the drudgery in my life ..

23.59 .. I’m in bed .. before midnight .. phew .. << grimace >>.

More to come ...

Memory Joggers ...

I didn’t sleep to well again .. I managed to empty my water glass by the time I got up ..

08.54 .. I get up and head down to make the tea .. via the loo.

09.10 .. I’m back in the bedroom with the tea .. It would be soo nice just to lay here and do nothing .. but I’m going to be late for the drudgery anyway. A brief cuddle follows.

10.40 .. I’m in that position ..

12.10 .. I’m cooked ..

13.10 .. I’m dressed and downstairs ..

13.30 .. Back up stairs to wash my hair ..

14.30 .. Lunch is served ..

15.00 .. I suddenly realise it’s getting dark outside .. cue hail storm .. soon the patio and lawn have quite a covering.

16.40 .. I give Christine’s mum a call on Skype out .. well it uses some credit up. I hadn’t heard from Christine yesterday as expected, apparently she’s been very busy in Chonburi, but was expecting to get the flight back today. As I write this she’s about 2 1/4 hours from landing at Heathrow .. and I need to meet her to get the spare number 3 dilator from her.

17.58 .. I head upstairs and start to put some eye’s on ready to go out.

18.05 .. Dinner is served .. spicy butternut soup .. and that’s it !!!

18.30 .. I go upstairs and finish putting my eyes on .. and a little lippy.

18.47 .. I’m finally on the road for Heathrow ..

19.06 .. I look east as I go along the M25 past Heathrow between J14 and J15 .. I see a stack of 4 aircraft coming in .. one should be Christine’s as her ETA was 19.10. It’s so cold out still I’ve managed to drive all the way here with a wedge of hailstones at the bottom of the rear window as I park in the short stay car park. 

19.20 .. I’m in terminal 3 arrivals hall and soon spot Martin, Christine’s friend who is going to drive her back to Whitby tonight. He’s expecting me. He’s been here since 18.00, as he’d miss judged the traffic from Essex. We chat while we wait .. not surprisingly about trans stuff and issues. Martin holds a very high up role with a major UK institution, and has had to deal with transsexuals in his jobs, he’s very understanding. He’s clearly a very good friend of Christine’s .. ready to scoop her up here and drive her all the way to Whitby in Yorkshire .. not sure many of my friends are that willing .. << smiles >>.

20.10 .. Christine appears in a wheelchair, and soon alights .. we chat briefly .. she’s looking really good .. she hands me my new number 3, and says the security people in Bangkok wanted to have a look at it. Martin wheels Christine’s luggage and we walk off towards the car park.

Having paid for the tickets, as you do we get in the lifts and head up, Martin is on level 4, my brain fails me and I go up to the third, rather than the second .. DOH .. and start to worry when I can’t find my car.

BING !! .. silly girl .. try looking on the second level .. phew .. there it is.

20.40 .. I refill the Cavalier at the Shell garage in Egham, then give Karen a call .. she’s still at her sisters.

20.55 .. I’m home .. I go to the PC and check my e-mails .. I need to resend the links to Gabby .. she hasn’t received them .. then I plough into some diary.

22.15 .. Karen is home ..

22.33 .. I head upstairs finally to dilate.

22.45 .. I’m finally in that position .. it doesn’t go to badly, 25 minutes to get to depth.

00.10 .. I’m cooked ...

00.35 .. Cleaned and creamed, I collect my water from the kitchen, turn the heating down and finally get to bed.

More to come ...

Initially I got myself quite comfy wedged and fell asleep pretty quick I think.

03.45 .. Something has woken me up, the wedge is missing from rolling around I assume .. I stick the cushion back between my legs but I’m aching down there .. and find it difficult to find that sweet spot again. I layed awake for ages, consuming a lot of water while I tossed and turned.

06.45 .. The alarm goes off waking us both up. I turn the TV on to get a weather forecast .. it’s no good us heading off to Alfreton to see Claire if we’re going to be hit by snow.

07.30 .. Karen brings some tea up.

07.50 .. I head down stairs to sort the kitchen routine out .. plug the laptop in and boot it so it can update ready for today’s planned trip to see Claire .. in the kitchen it’s the Saturday morning weigh in .. 13st 11 1/4 lb .. hmmmm .. not good.

08.20 .. I’m in that position .. getting to depth this morning isn’t easy, even relaxing to music rather than watching TV. Karen comes up and talks to me through the spare bedroom door .. she’s just spoken to somebody at the care home, it’s chucking snow down there .. so our trip is definitely off .. for today.

09.50 .. I’m cooked .. well that wasn’t as bad as I thought in the end. I head for the bathroom .. and end up hurting myself doing the cleanse session. Having used my douche, I still use a couple of squirts from the ex Thailand 50Ml syringe, followed by a final rinse with Povidine solution as I was asked to do “for two months at home” by Dr Suporn. I miss placed the syringe on the second rinse .. too far forward .. gosh that hurt .. lucky an inspection during the cream session shows no damage.

10.40 .. I’m dressed and ready for action .. we need to go do some food shopping.

11.35 .. Karen and I head for Waitrose in Sunningdale .. gosh it’s busy today. Karen moans at the size of the bill when we’ve finished .. yet she’s the one whose loaded the trolley up .. LOL. Back at home we discover we’ve been charged twice for one item .. not a cheap one either .. Karen isn’t interested in going back to complain .. ho hum.

12.25 .. We are back home .. time for lunch. Lunch is wholemeal “french bread”, some pate, Gorgonzola, Brie, some olives and tomatoes. I save some bread for a good slick of honey .. cake proper is an egg custard tart .. delicious .. <<grins >>.  

12.55 .. Lunch is over .. I give Christine a call in Whitby. She got home safely last night, just 4 hours from Heathrow. They had driven through a lot of snow in Derbyshire last night on the M1, where Alfreton is, but fearing the worst then found the moors across to Whitby was clear .. she looks out of her window .. still no snow on the moor tops she can see from home.

13.15 .. I’m checking my e-mails when I get this one from somebody who has stumbled over my diary while searching on MSN. This is seriously the first shitty e-mail I’ve had like this so I’ll laugh it off, but I had to reply ..

Robert Baillie wrote:

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/sarah_helene/diary/diary37.html
 
I thought my life was UTTER crap.... but...
 
Sorry petal.  I don't mean to be nasty but...
 
Bob.

So having traced his entry into my site I had to reply ..

Search Engine: search.live.com
Search Words: nursing home, nigerian, bursledon
Time of Visit           Mar 22 2008 1:08:00 am
Last Page View           Mar 22 2008 1:08:00 am
Visit Length           0 seconds
Page Views           1

I suggest at 1.08 am isn't a good time to look for nursing homes .. take care .. worth a mention in my diary ..

best regards...

Sarah Hélène G.

It was interesting that with those search words, my diary was the 3rd highest (non sponsored) hit .. does that mean I get a lot of visitors .. yes .. but not by searching for “nursing home, nigerian, bursledon” .. I had to laugh .. In that page I’d mentioned “Bursledon” and “nursing home” .. didn’t pick up the pages where I’ve moaned about Nigerian’s hitting on me on Yahoo .. LOL. Oh and the “visit length 0 seconds” is a common sign .. it’s because the page was cached by his ISP ( Virgin )

I followed a link on an e-mail from one of the groups I’m in .. a TS called Alison whose been asking advise on surgery options .. and I’d replied to her posting. The “welcome” page looked familiar content wise, so I open two browser tabs and find her’s is mine with a small edit, she even has my deliberate typo error in it and a couple of oddly placed upper case letters. I really don’t mind .. but I send her an e-mail to G her up .. LOL. What no credit or link !!!

14.20 .. We head for my mum’s via the lottery ticket shop. Last weeks £10 winnings pays for our fortnightly ticket and two lucky dips for tonight.

14.45 .. We are at my mum’s. It’s the usual routine, Karen gives me a prompt to bring up Melissa’s last email to me from the USA, where she mentioned that she and I are in the dog house with our mothers .. something my mum wrote to her mum linking our two names somehow. Mum denies any wrong doing .. yeah right mum .. maybe Melissa will get to copy it and scan it to me.

A video tape she’s been having sound problems with again plays perfectly for me on her machine .. but I show her how to switch between the HI-FI track and the linear mono one, like she used to do with her old video recorder. Of course this one uses a different labelled button to achieve this.

Eventually we get a cup of tea and biscuits .. the tea isn’t too good mum .. Karen moans later.

17.10 .. We head for home, and get caught by Egham Sation level crossing .. we cop this more often than we don’t.

17.30 .. We are home. Karen makes a decent cup of tea, which washes down a Waitrose Bramley apple hot cross bun .. lovely.

18.45 .. I get a reply from Alison .. she who borrowed my front page .. LOL .. she’s owned up .. it’s Ok she’s been following my diary it seems and my progress .. she’s thinking about Dr Suporn too.

19.35 .. I give Mary a call and order our food .. Karen’s gone for the grilled chicken in garlic sauce, mine is the kung po chicken just for a change. Deep fried bean curd with garlic, salt and chilli and a couple of boiled rice’s completes the deal. “15 - 20 minutes please Sarah” . .is the reply.

19.45 .. We head off to Bagshot to collect the food .. hmmm .. there’s snow settled on the Cavalier a bit. In Bagshot parking is a nightmare .. Karen stays in the car as I head in to collect the food .. gosh the 75 yd walk is freezing , I have a short wait for the food.

20.10 .. We are home .. Karen chose a bottle of Menetou Salon earlier, Karen extracts it from the fridge and slaps a chill jacket on it .. leaving me to open it .. team work .. LOL.

20.30 .. Back to the PC, Lychees in hand ..

21.05 .. Karen’s made a cup of tea .. time to break from here, I’ll have to head up stairs once consumed ..

21.35 .. Ready to head up stairs .. well I was, except an e-mail came in that I had to answer.

22.35 .. I’m finally in that position .. DOH .. well the dilation didn’t go easy at all, mind you my mind did keep wandering off watching the TV.

It took ages to get to depth with number 2, 45 minutes ..

In the end I’m dilating while watching a film about a German submarine .. with sub titles .. the film is gripping .. so much so towards the end I’m laying there with the dilator still inside me till the film ends.

I head for the bathroom to do the cleanse and cream routine. Back on the bed, I dosed off once creamed .. oop’s.

Completed from memory and memory joggers on the way to see Claire Monday 24th March.

01.35 .. I’m finally in bed .. judging from my water glass later it wasn’t too bad a night.

06.45 .. The alarm goes off .. and on goes the TV to check out the weather. Karen gets up and heads down stairs and phones the home in Alfreton .. still snowing and they have a good covering apparently .. so looks like seeing Claire is off again.

07.30 .. The TV goes off and we snuggle down again .. now if this had been me before Thailand I probably would have just layed there .. but I was out like a light pretty quickly .. for longer than I would have reckoned possible.

10.15 .. I’m a wake all of a sudden and look at the clock .. oo er .. I get up and get the tea, via a comfort break.

10.55 .. I get up and head downstairs. I don’t bother with a weight check .. it’ll be a disaster anyway .. breakfast is consumed in front of the PC. Well I’m having to drop back to one Progynova a day till I get my new prescription, hopefully by Wednesday .. or I’m out completely.

11.50 .. I’m finally in the spare room preparing for the drudgery .. it goes pretty well as usual, using the short cut method.

13.20 .. I am cooked .. time to clean and cream.

14.10 .. I’m downstairs dressed for what ever the day has in store for us.

14.20 .. Time for lunch .. << grimace >> ..  it’s bread with pate, 3 different cheese’s, olives and some vine cherry tomatoes .. lovely. Cake is the last of my miniature birthday cake. 

14.57 .. I’m back at the PC .. and find a message box open from Kylie in Truro .. we chat for a while and she posts me a link to another girls Yahoo 360 page and blog .. I know her .. as an ex Suporn girl herself, though I did mistake her for a similarly named Dr Chettawut girl initially till the penny dropped as I read parts of her blog. Kylie and I chat for a while, she’s clearly hurting because her health won’t allow her to transition as she’d like .. it’s very difficult the later you leave it, as my friend Laura from Switzerland has found out. But Kylie is such a nice person, we’ve been chatting for years on and off .. I do feel for her.

15.32 .. “Sarah B” pops up for a chat on Yahoo .. it’s a small world .. apparently she saw me in Heathrow T3 arrivals on Friday as I was talking to Martin waiting for Christine to arrive:

Sarah B (23/03/2008 15:32:48): were you at the airport on friday ?????
Sarah_Heleneuk (23/03/2008 15:32:57): yes
Sarah B (23/03/2008 15:33:17): i walk by you you where chating to some guy
Sarah_Heleneuk (23/03/2008 15:33:24): 19.15 - 20.20
Sarah B (23/03/2008 15:33:33): t3 arrivals
Sarah_Heleneuk (23/03/2008 15:33:48): yes .. Martin, Christine from whitby's friend / lift
Sarah_Heleneuk (23/03/2008 15:34:02): yes .. you should have said hello
Sarah B (23/03/2008 15:34:40): it was ok i was in a rush saw you were deep in conversion
Sarah_Heleneuk (23/03/2008 15:34:50) :(
Sarah B (23/03/2008 15:35:26): thought he was hitting on you you looked fab by the way

<<< SNIP >> .. we talk about several things including where we live, and sort of agree to meet in the flesh .. in the future at a pub / restaurant we both know.

15.55 .. I spot Abby in Arizona on line .. I send her a message .. no response ..

The late afternoon is split between watching TV, doing some diary and doing another page of photo’s for the diary ..

18.05 .. Abby spotted my message from earlier and responds .. we chat for a while as we haven’t chatted for a while .. she points me to a blog entry she’s done .. about the legal situation of a transsexual revealing her breasts in public .. it’s OK for a man to bare his chest .. and if your in a US state where M to F transsexuals are still regarded as men !!!??? .. indeed.
   
18.15 .. Kathie from near Seattle in the USA pops up for a chat, one of the friends I made in Chon Buri, she was Vanessa’s helper .. she has loads of news for me .. as I have for her. We talk a bout a few things, including the London eye which she went on during a lightning trip to England a couple of years ago. ..

19.06 .. Kathie has to go .. and I know dinner is nearly ready here ..

19.15 .. Dinner is served .. Waitrose prepared roast duck with pork, apple and apricot stuffing .. with honey roast turnips and carrots, roast potatoes and peas .. gosh it was sooooo good, but there is rather a lot of it too .. a little red wine washes it down. Pudding is some mango ice cream.

19.45 .. Back to the PC .. I finish day 21 of my photo section, days 22 - 24 I have no pictures for at the moment ..

20.15 .. Suddenly a very urgent call of nature .. oo er .. gosh this is the second time today it’s happened like this .. I’m not sure what has caused this .. jut I must keep up with the Movicol, I can’t risk swinging the other way, though this might bea reaction to yesterday’s apparent lack of motion.

21.00 .. Karen brings a cup of tea .. it helps some easter egg down .. the scales, the scales ... << grimace >>. 

21.55 .. I finally head up stairs .. only to sit on the throne again for a while .. oo er .. well the dilatation should go really easy. I wash and change ready for bed, post drudgery.

22.30 .. I’m finally in the position ..

00.10 .. I’m cooked .. after the clean and cream, I get stuck into a film ( Cellular ) as I do my relax session .. fatal really .. watching TV that is .. I must get my sound sample track sorted out for concentrated dilation .. it’s an idea I have .. something I’ll have to try and create with Audacity.

12.55 .. I return to the bathroom to moisturise my legs that are really starting to crumble with the twice a day washing, I wish I could do the cleanse without having to shower off my lower half .. I need to get a “Muslim shower” installed ..   

Completed from memory and memory joggers on the way to see Claire Monday 24th March.

M01.05 .. I’m in bed .. In didn’t sleep to well as the water glass indicates when the alarm goes off.

02.30 .. I’d been a sleep and awake to find my back is cold .. Karen’s nicked the duvet .. it’s not unusual .. I have to wrestle some from her, which disturbs her briefly .. “ purr, purr ..  what you doing?” .. purr, purr”

06.45 .. The alarm goes off .. gosh it feels cold even though the heating is running in the back ground.

06.57 .. I’ve got to get going .. I get up and head for the kitchen via a comfort break. A weight check showing 13st 12 1/4 lbs isn’t what I want to see .. I need to start eating smaller meals for sure.

07.25 .. I’m in the spare bedroom getting ready for the drudgery.

07.30 .. I’m in the position .. gosh I wish I’d turned the heating up more and earlier .. brrrrrr. Even though it’s been just seven hours since I was here, getting depth is a struggle .. I decide to do a full 15 minutes quality time too with number 2, rather than use the time saving short cut .. I’m not sure if it’s been helping really.

08.15 .. I’m cooked with number 2 .. prep and swap to number 3 ..

08.40 .. I’m cooked .. Karen is in the bathroom .. I head down stairs to get the laptop ready for today. I’m still unsure if we are actually going to try and get to see Claire today .. it’s down to Karen really.

09.10 .. I’m in the bathroom for the cleanse, shower and cream routine.

09.40 .. I’ve showered and dried my body, my hair really does need doing. I’m laying on the spare bed when Karen comes up, looks like we are going now, but she throws a wobbly when I say I want to wash my hair before we go .. so I won’t then.

10.05 .. I’m in the drive, I open both cars up and refill the washer bottles on both .. adding a splash of extra antifreeze screen wash into both to make it more concentrated. I move the Jazz out into the road, without my doughnut .. well that wasn’t as painful as I thought it might be .. << smiles >>. Karen has another rant over which car to use, she’s worried that Kate the Tom Tom’s traffic receiver won’t work without a car radio .. I explain that’s all built into Kate.

10.16 .. We drive away from home, Karen’s at the wheel despite me saying I wanted to drive there in the Cavalier. It’s going to be a horrible drive anyway without a radio, though Kate can play MP3's .. which is some relief. I rig Kate up, though it takes me a few frustrating moments to get into Kate’s set up to redirect the MP3 sound through it’s built in loudspeaker.

11.37 .. Karen pulls off the motorway into a services so she can snatch a comfort break .. she says she can’t do the 34 miles to the next one .. << grimace >>.

11.45 .. Back on the road .. did I mention Mrs Schumacker is driving again .. we are taking minutes of Kate’s ETA time in Alfreton every six or seven miles.

12.40 .. We arrive at the M&S services where the A42 joins the M1 .. time for lunch.

We use the loo’s then head towards the M&S food section, via the Thornton’s chocolate shop. They are selling off the Easter bits half price .. what shocks me is the egg I bought in Camberley last week for £9.99 including free iced on name, was apparently being sold here for £10.99 with no name .. well there is a lesson .. never buy from Thornton’s shops in motorway service area’s. However the chance of some half price Easter goodies, a dark chocolate egg moi and five milk chocolate lollipops for Claire, all for £4.50 is too good to miss. Claire will get one chocolate lollipop per visit from the next visit, as we have a load of eggs for her today.

Lunch .. a chicken and bacon roll for me, a chicken salad sandwich for Karen. A potted desert for both of us and we share a bottle of orange and mango juice.

13.15 .. We head on towards Claire’s care home in Alfreton .. so where is all the snow ?

We don’t get far along the M1 when we hit a new road work area with timed 50mph camera’s .. lovely.

13.48 .. We arrive at Claire’s care home .. the sun is shining .. not a spec of snow to be seen anywhere. As I get out I see the state the car is in .. good grief .. soo much salt and yuck collected in one trip.

Claire seems happy enough to see us, which is a relief. Her eye’s light up at the various easter eggs and other goodies. When we first arrived she was watching Shrek 3 on DVD. Her minder goes and makes us a cup of tea .. on her return she apologises for making “dish water tea” .. nice .. sadly she’s not wrong either. “Maybe it’s because I only leave the tea bag in for 5 seconds” .. “I think that is probably the reason then” I reply.

I don’t get a look in on the cuddles front .. it’s just Karen all the time .. did I need to come I ask myself. I sit across the room on a not so comfortable chair firing off the camera when Claire has a smile on her face .. in about 40 pictures, I think I got one or two where both Karen and Claire are smiling.

Shrek 3 ends and as we’ve bought 6 DVD’s for her to watch, “backed up” ones of what she has at home, I go through what I’ve bought, once I’ve said S Club 7 she’s made her mind up.

15.15 .. She tells us to go for the first time .. well that didn’t take to long then. It’s also shift change time too .. one minder arrives, the tea maker leaves.

S Club 7 is one of Claire’s favourite Video / DVD’s .. and would normally get up and dance to it, but she’s clinging to Karen and cries when a couple of slower ballad type tracks play .. we think it’s the lyrics. With all this inactivity I could easily fall asleep.

16.15 .. We head for home, as we leave the building a few snow flakes are falling, it’s bitterly cold exposed to the wind. Karen wants to drive again .. who am I to argue.

We hit the M1 at J27 heading south for J23A and the A42 / M42, the speed controlled stretch where they are widening the carriageway is grinding along at about 50 mph, but the traffic is building. The A42/M42 runs really smoothly, Mrs Schumacker makes the most of it. Soon the traffic receiver in Kate indicates a problem, Karen accepts the offer to recalculate a new route.  

Well the advanced warning was for nothing, the M42 around the east of Birmingham has a 60 mph limit .. the traffic could easily go faster. The M40 runs well initially .. and I’m worried about how Mrs Schumacker is going for it to .. my poor car !!! One thing Karen spots is that Warwick services is pretty well smack on half way between us and Alfreton .. shame motorway junctions aren’t close by. This will be the place then if they deliver Claire half way to us in the future, well at least till all the M1 road works are finished at the London end.

17.50 .. At M40 J9 the traffic is building and speeds drop to the legal limit or less .. sometimes .. << grimace >.. Kate suddenly squalks a warning .. traffic delay 20 miles ahead .. that’ll be around J8 for Oxford .. hmmm .. we join it 1.4miles early at J8A. From there it’s a 30 mph crawl till a couple of miles past J8. At J5 we come across an accident, an old Fiesta has run into the back of an old Corsa right on the exit .. hmmm .. those two are right offs.

18.43 .. Karen doesn’t get back into her stride again .. speed varies between 10 - 30 mph till we get to M40 J4 where we turn off and cut down to the M4 at Maidenhead for Bracknell .. then  down towards M3 J3 and home.

19.03 .. We are in Bracknell .. dinner tonight is going to be cold duck legs and salad .. shame .. I was looking forward to a Bracknell Kentucky .. but after this mornings scales .. we’d better not. Though we did discuss briefly whether a Kentucky would be good as we drove past on the wrong side of the dual carriageway, Karen was driving and at the last minute decided to drive on home rather than do a loop round through Kentucky .. << sulks >> .. LOL.

19.18 .. We are home. There’s a couple of answer phone messages ..

19.38 .. Dinner is served .. it’s duck leg salad, a few olives thrown in for good measure. Desert was Strawberries and ice cream ..

20.05 .. To the PC .. there’s a long e-mail from Melissa in the USA, and an apology of sorts from "Bob" regarding the e-mail I mentioned yesterday .. he hadn't realised I was TS:

"Aaaah, it now dawns on me.  What made me say get a life was because of all the detail meticulously laid out, minute by minute.  And now you have said TS I take that to mean transsexual?  It then makes sense to me why you would keep such a detailed diary!  Although I'm not sure if I'd want to remember everything.  Just get from A to B so to speak.
 
I get into all sorts of stuff early in the morning more often than not after a few beers.  Quite often I don't even read things properly before I go off on one, as it were, so that might explain my comments.
 
Oh well, no harm done I hope.  Good luck with your 'journey'.
 
Bob.
 
p.s. I've been to the Folly it's a nice pub".

I visit Alison’s site .. she’s given me a credit now for her front page .. and a link in the credit .. but it’s to my old Tiscali site. I send her an e-mail thanking her and include the link as it should be.

21.00 .. Karen’s made a cup of tea .. ideal for washing down my Lindt dark chocolate bunny .. sorry scales .. << grimace >>.

21.40 .. I finally head up stairs .. this dilation might be difficult .. but hey .. got to be positive.

22.20 .. I’m finally in that position .. it takes 35 minutes to get to depth with number 2 .. << groan >>

There’s a James Bond film on .. doh .. it’s a distraction for sure.

23.55 .. Well I’m cooked .. distraction or not, that wasn’t very pleasant. I head for the bathroom so do the cleanse before returning to the spare room to cream. Creamed, I lay back under the 2nd duvet and watch to the end of the film.

00.35 .. The film is over .. I sort things down stairs .. Nightie night. 

Completed from memory and memory joggers on Tuesday 25th March.

M06.45 .. The alarm goes off .. my water glass is full, so it must have been a reasonable night .. LOL.

07.00 .. Karen returns with a cup of tea .. I’m granted a brief cuddle.

07.35 .. I get up and head down stairs. The downstairs loo door was shut .. so “the fridge” is that cold .. brrrrrr. Sorted there in record time .. << grimace >> .. I do a quick weight check .. just as Karen arrives .. 13st 11 1/4 lb .. phew.

07.50 .. Breakfast is consumed in front of the PC checking my emails .. I’ve got one from an old school friend. He’s married to another old school acquaintance who he coupled up with as they say at a school reunion I went to 13 years ago. He’d heard about “my changes” through another girl from school. I’ll have to do an answer later.

As I head upstairs, I finally remember to take my new number 3 with me that Christine delivered to me Friday night. I compare it with my battered number three .. hmmmm .. it’s a different shape .. slightly less tapered in the bullet shaped end .. and as for the markings .. they are in a different position from the sharp end .. not a lot, but visibly so .. a couple of millimetres out .. why ? Silk screening is an accurate science normally, it’s not a hit and miss “black art”.

10.20 .. I’m in the spare room preparing for the drudgery when I hear a van pull up outside, I get up again and rush downstairs .. wrong .. it’s for next door.

10.25 .. I’m in that position .. getting to number 2's depth is a problem again ..    

11.55 .. I’m in the bathroom when I hear a van pull up outside .. I quickly head downstairs thinking it might be the collection I’m waiting for .. it’s not .. it’s a Post Office van delivering my ink jet cartridges from MX2.

A quick check on my company e-mails sees a request for help .. I email the freelance engineer with the information he needs .. oh joy of joys .. somebody else to deal with a broken Saniflow unit in the ground floor gents .. LOL.

I head back up stairs to complete my cleanse, shower and cream.

12.45 .. I’m sorted .. dressed and ready for the day.

13.15 .. Time for lunch .. a ham sandwich, an apple and a banana .. working style.

13.45 .. I head to the kitchen to do some washing up .. the baking tins from Sunday night take a while .. << grimace >>.

14.15 .. My Skype phone starts to ring .. it’s Christine from Whitby. She’s getting back into the swing of life in Whitby where she is still very much the local hero with many folk. She has a lot of friends who are all rallying around her and taking care of her. I promise we’ll go up and see her to do an overnight while seeing Claire one weekend .. her mum wants to meet Karen and I and other friends of hers who have already met us are wanting the same.

I’m still doing the washing up, which Christine is aware of when :

14.25 .. There’s a van pulled up outside, City Link, and the driver walks across the lawn ( thanks mate ) empty handed and knocks on the front door. I’ve guessed this was the collection for Ebuyer, taking away the two car radio / cd players .. and it was.

14.37 .. Christine has things to do too .. I carry on and finish the washing up and then tackle the sink and bowl .. all nice and clean again.

15.10 .. Audrey from the USA pops up for a chat. It’s all good news from her, she’s getting on Ok with the self maintenance and she’s escaped living with her girlfriends parents into her own place looking forward to finishing at college. She sounds so much happier in the way she’s chatting to me, though her voice is still affected by her surgery.

 15.50 .. Audrey drifts off .. given the time difference I suspect she might have gone off for some maintenance .. she suddenly comes back and says she’s actually at work .. we agree to chat later.

16.06 .. Karen is home, early, she catches me with chocolate .. << grins >> .. time for a cup of tea and a hot cross bun .. lovely.

16.45 .. Time to play with “Audacity” .. except Karen wants the PC. So I do a few other things, like filling in a form for Surrey Heath to stay on the residents consulting committee, the form came addressed in my old name .. so it gets returned updated !!!

I boot my laptop so I can work on my diary across the network.

18.20 .. Dinner is served .. meat balls with garlic Tagliatelle .. it’s lovely. Dessert is a couple of french style pan cakes with maple syrup and vanilla ice cream. 

18.45 .. Back at the main PC .. some e-mails to answer ..

19.00 .. I spot a member pending on SRSinThailand .. her profile is completely blank .. so I reject the application .. checking the moderator activity shows that Tina rejected her 45 minutes earlier .. so I e-mail “Tatiana” as to why .. did she actually read the membership requirements .. I guess not.

19.35 .. I finally get to try doing an audio track to dynamic dilate too .. it uses 4 sounds .. waves breaking on a beach ( 15 secs ), seagulls ( 2 secs ), wind in a forest with a wind chime every 3 seconds ( 15 secs ), more seagulls ( 2 secs ). It’s all “mixed and faded using Audacity .. and using the repeat technique I’ve generated a 23 minute track .. 

21.45 .. I’m ready to go up .. except I want to try using what I’ve created. A little messing about as I discover Audacity was defaulted to 48Kbs for MP3 export .. it sounds appalling .. so I try 128Kbs .. it still sounds rough as the nature sounds I’ve used where very dynamic and clean .. so I go for 320Kbs .. that is acceptable.

22.16 .. A disk is burnt .. time to sort myself out.

22.40 .. I’m in that position and my 320kbs MP3 is playing, the 128kbs sounds to much like an MP3, kills the natural sounds dead. This really focuses the mind and uses the timing suggested by Sophie in her “advanced dilation technique” lecture.

23.28 .. I’m cooked !!! .. I declare that works .. this is actually very good .. I could create a whole bunch of these easily now I’ve worked out what I need to do with in Audacity.

23.55 .. I’m cleansed, creamed and in bed .. nightie night.

To hear a low bandwidth sample click here.

Completed from memory and memory joggers Wednesday 26th March.

Well I slept pretty well to be honest ..

07.25 .. I’m up .. I head downstairs to the kitchen via the down stairs loo .. brrrrr .. I really must open that door wide when I come to bed .. though I’m sure when Karen comes down she’ll close it again, keeping it fridge like.

Breakfast is consumed in front of the computer .. I have a couple to answer, and a couple to write.

The radio station I work at is a year old, with it’s current name anyway, there’s going to be a party .. tomorrow .. I’m going to drive up late in the afternoon to join in. Sarah from work want’s to know what I want to eat .. so I e-mail her and put a request in for a car park slot, I’ll have to pay a congestion charge, hopefully I won’t have to pay £9 for 90 minutes parking on a meter too.

There’s an announcement from work, by e-mail, that our new MD has been given a promotion already to make him group deputy CE .. it’s good news for him so I send a congrats e-mail .. which results in a quick reply from him asking about my health.

Well time flies, I really should have gone and done the drudgery earlier, but I finish yesterday’s diary and make a page to launch my sound files from if people want to down load or listen to them. That takes a short while too ..

12.31 .. I’m in that position and I start the clock .. It’s nearly 14 hours since the last dilation .. but I get to what looks like depth in 10 minutes with number 2 .. 5 minutes quality time follows. Prep and swap to number 3, takes 12 minutes to get to depth .. 15 minutes quality time ..

13.15 .. Sorted .. 45 minutes .. yippee. But it’s late and I’m hungry .. so gripping a sheet of kitchen roll between my legs .. I wander downstairs and eat my lunch .. in front of the PC.

14.15 .. To the bathroom to get myself sorted .. my hair needs a wash really but I think I’ll leave it tomorrow .. it’ll do tomorrow night and Friday nights meal out too. My feet are getting into a terrible state after standing in Betadine residue and being washed twice a day. The skin is really rough, so I take an emery board to them and then rub some cream in.

15.10 .. I’m finally sorted and back down stairs .. guess I should nip round the chemist in Lightwater to see if my hormone prescription has been filled.

15.55 .. I head off to Lightwater and my usual chemists .. DOH .. I’d written Lloyd’s Lightwater on the top of my repeat form when I put it in at the doctors .. so they sent it to the Lloyds chemist, which isn’t in Lightwater .. what was Lloyds in Lightwater, is now Alliance .. and it’s about to become a branch of Boot’s !!!. The pharmacist rings the Lloyds chemist in another village .. yes they have my prescription .. but not the items to fill it .. should be OK to collect tomorrow lunchtime .. bum.

16.25 .. I’m home .. Karen isn’t back yet.

16.45 .. Karen is home .. and makes a cup of tea. She gives her brother Gary a call to invite him and Katy to the Indian on Friday night with her dad & Chris.

17.00 .. I call Carolyn at work, to try and sort out a car park slot for tomorrow .. we haven’t chatted for a few weeks .. we’ll catch up tomorrow when I get there.

I spend some time down loading some nice sounds for me to be creative with for dilation purposes.

18.50 .. Dinner is served .. Sweet potato and corn chowder soup. Rapidly followed by cheese and biscuits, a few olives and a cabanossi sausage .. pudding is a black cherry yoghurt.

19.35 .. Back to the PC .. some more surfing for audio samples .. I need to find some more substantial sounds to as in countryside atmos .. without road and aircraft noises.

20.30 .. I think I might go for an early dilation .. see if what happens tonight.

21.00 .. I’m in the bathroom just finishing my ablutions when Karen calls upstairs asking if I want a cup of tea .. “oh go on then” .. fatal.

21.35 .. I’m in that position, yeah I know early start .. I’ve got number 2 inside me and I hit play on the DVD player for my dilation sound track .. nothing. I guess what it is .. but can do nothing about it till change over .. it’s that ruddy Bush Freeview box has latched up again .. the fact it won’t give a picture itself let alone switch to the DVD as a “feed through” is the indicator .. grrrrr.

Well it took me 25 minutes to reach depth and 5 minutes quality time. Out comes number 2, giving me an opportunity to go over and power off the Bush crap box to “reboot” it .. before number 3 goes in I check it .. it works.

22.35 .. Well that wasn’t a very relaxing session, but it’s done.

23.10 .. Cleansed, creamed and sorted downstairs .. I climb into bed .. nightie night.

Completed from memory and memory joggers Thursday 27th March.