Last post for a while ...

Anyway, this will be my last post here for a while. I guess most people who read my blog will know that I have been diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma ... so on Monday I head off to hospital for 2 weeks to start the treatment. I should be finished that sometime in November ...

I decided to set up another blog about this 'chapter' of my life! http://lymphomajourney.blogspot.com/ Mostly because I want to be able to close the door on it when I've finished treatment and the doctor gives me the all clear (as much as you can ever get an all clear once something like this happens to you!)

So head on over there to follow my ups and downs through a side of life that I never wanted to know about, but will now be having an intimate experience with!! As I keep telling everyone, I'm completely positive about the outcome and just want/need to get through it and out the other side!

See you there (the blog I mean, not cancer!!! )

And I'll be back posting here next year sometime ... :)

I ache all over ... :)

After yesterday's yoga class I am aching all over today! Particularly some (hitherto unknown!) muscles below my shoulder-blades at the front. Owww!! I can only think it relates to something Iain (and Maxine) were reminding me about - particularly in sun salutes but in loads of asanas. And that is to broaden my back (at the same time as dropping my shoulder-blades down my back). Apparently what I've been doing in the past is squeezing my shoulder-blades together, and thus hollowing my back.

Sometimes it feels like you have to think about soo many different things in each asana, Tighten my thigh muscles, widen my hands, lift my chest, drop my shoulders, broaden my back, don't forget the bandhas, ujiyi breathing ... etc etc etc!!

On a completely different note, here's a picture of someone who wanted to join in when my Mum, friend Ross and I went up the coast and out for lunch in the glorious Spirit House restaurant. He/she is a water dragon - a sort of goanna/lizard ... We were sitting beside the lake (I always request that!), and as well as the glorious food they serve there, it's just lovely to sit and enjoy the birds and wildlife there. The waiter told us not to feed the wildlife - apparently the chefs do feed them out the back!!

Anyone coming to Australia, you should make a big effort to go to this wonderful restaurant! You won't be disappointed!! The gardens are glorious, the food is out of this world (Thai-inspired), the ambiance is perfect! (Do I sound like an advertisement for the Spirit House?!!) :)

News from downunder

Well, I guess it's way past time that I posted again ... And just to put us all in the mood, here is my gorgeous pussycat Mieke, doing what she does most of the day, snoozing away!!

I've been pretty busy helping a friend put up the 4th edition of her online poetry website, foam:e But now that's done - uploaded the files last night.

I've also got some more website work - a couple of astrology websites! Wendy, the graphic designer I work with, joked that we might specialise in doing new age websites, as there's another similar one to do waiting in the wings!

Yoga is going good ... went to class on Saturday and had one of those practices where everything seemed great. Got lots of attention from the teachers and new things to try (in poses I've already been given). Those sort of days don't come all the time - sometimes I'm just dying for the class to come to an end (especially on a Saturday afternoon/early evening!)

I've also started going to this women's gym (Curves). I lost a lot of weight a year or so ago, and I really feel the need to 'tone my body up' a bit! I also need to build up my upper body strength (for yoga) and I'm hoping I can do this here to. It's just circuit-training - 30 minutes on various machines, plus 5-10 minutes stretches at the end. (Which I am religiously doing to make sure I don't lose flexibility!) And 3 times a week - on the way home! I may up it to 4 times a week - see how I go.

I guess if I had a 6-day a week yoga practice I mightn't need to do this, but the fact is I don't! One class a week, plus self-practice (at work) 3 times a week - that seems to be the most I can do ...

Seems good - I'm hoping for good things! (I do better when I'm pushed, rather than having to push myself!!)

back to class ...

Went back to class last Saturday for the first time for a month. They'd been closed for a month - a richly deserved holiday for the yoga teachers!! Anyway, even though I'd been practicing a bit, I could hardly walk the next day I was so stiff! Muscles I'd completely forgotten about speaking loudly to me ... Luckily it was a hot Sunday and all I had to do was collapse and watch one of the one-day matches on TV.

Even hotter now - 34degC I think. So I'm glad to be at work in the air-con ...

Apricot jam, and music, and the environment, and cricket ...

Back home after a lovely lazy fun-filled holiday! Down at my Mum's in NSW we celebrated Christmas on the Saturday (23rd) as the relatives couldn't come on Christmas Day ...

And on Christmas day we had a quiet day and ended up making Apricot Jam with the apricots from Mum's tree - which was completely laden! Such a nice thing to do (and it is delicious!!)










Then it was back on the plane and up to Woodford ... Here are a few photos ...

street scene


Flamenco Fire


Afro Dizziac playing


Street Performer outside the Circus tent


"Seagulls" at the Woodford cricket match, stealing food!!

Saw/heard some wonderful music, dancing, even a demo of Capoeira which is just incredible! If I wasn't doing Ashtanga I'd be really tempted to have a go at that ... Saw Tim Freedman (singer from The Whitlams), Po' Girl (a Canadian group), John Butler Trio - and heaps of others.

It was great to collapse in the village green area and find a Woodford cricket match going on! Complete with Tony Greig (sound-alike!) commentator! All the kids were joining in - and then these street performing 'seagulls' appeared and having interfered with the ball in the game, then decided to wander through the crowd and try and steal their food (chips etc!!) Hilarious!!! (I won't mention the 55+-year-old male streaker that appeared! Some things should be left unsaid - and unseen!!!)

And one of the (many!) really great things was getting a chance to hear Bob Brown (Australian Green Senator) speak a couple of times. He is such a wonderful speaker, and is so clear on the importance of our environment. Everyone there - we all wanted him to be the next Prime Minister of Australia! One thing he said really stuck with me. That when people say that the economy will go to pieces if we put the environment first, to remember that when women were trying to get the vote, everyone then said that if women got the vote it would be disastrous for the economy. And how ridiculous is that now!!! He also said that suffragettes fought for many many years to get the vote, but eventually they succeeded. And we have to be like that about the environment.