Tuesday

Good evening,

Well at last I am updating, with a machine round my neck and arms.

Yesterday when the rain stopped, I went and did the care home. I did the cigarette bins, which always earns me brownie points. I got a lot of odds and ends done.

Then I went and had lunch on the way to walk the dog.

I took the dog to the cliffs, and it was a bit muddy, and she insisted on pulling me through the mud and freaking me out by heading for the cliff edge all the time.
This is the young dog, so I can't let her off the lead. The sea was roaring and the clouds gloomed the sea and the cliffs, and not a soul was out there but us.

We came back all muddy, and had a cup of tea, well the dog didn't have a cup of tea, she had some gravy bones, but me and her owner had tea, and talked.

Then I came home.

I was in luck with assignments, a reasonably paid 2000 word one was up, so I took it, and am working on it now, due in tomorrow afternoon.

I just got on with paperwork all evening but was tired, I went to sleep at a reasonable time, but had nightmares and was unsettled, I had trouble waking this morning and felt ill and depressed and was up later than expected, so I couldn't get much written work done before my other work.
I had a heavy garden clearance job planned today, and as I loaded the car and set out, it started raining. It wasn't due to rain, and thankfully it cleared.

I did do a very heavy day's work, reminding myself all the time that I am a gardener with a broken back and that I still have to be aware of the risk and continue to think about the future. I don't want to think about quitting gardening, I think the hard work over the years has helped by keeping my muscles strong and thus supporting the broken back and the connective tissue disorder.
The broken bones never mended because I wasn't aware I had broken my back, and thus will never mend, and it shows as an ominous black space on the x-ray.
I have not been told to give up gardening, just to be careful, but do you think medical people in London could imagine a female doing the same work as a man in gardening? They probably think I plant up window boxes. I know the impact of my work on me better than anyone.
I want to go on gardening, part time.

Anyway, I did a hard day's work, hands full of thorns, nettle stings and things, my back and neck were feeling the strain, but at least I was brought cups of tea, and I had cooked sausages this morning and done sausage sandwiches for lunch.

At the end of the day I was paid, and I headed home via the mail handling centre so that I could pay my bill.
My landlady was here, losing keys and rattling about. I helped her find the keys.

I cooked myself chicken and rice for supper, and I am in bed with a hot water bottle for my broken back, and the heavy machine on my neck. I am working on this writing piece, which is a cross between and advert and an article, and it has to be in tomorrow afternoon.

Tomorrow I start work for this new client, the nice disabled lady. I will be there about four hours and the rest of the day is for writing.