Red Leicester

Stop Press! Tom has just put the laptop in the fridge! Oh yes, I am writing this from the second shelf down, beside the cucumbers. No really, we have three laptops in the house (one of the few freebies available from the Cambridge Computer Lab, along with giant cardboard boxes that used to house giant computers), so I am writing on my very own laptop. And Tom is writing on his, but the new development for the one in the fridge is rather worrying. It is the laptop that controls our telly, and to say we'd be lost if it doesn't recover would be something of an understatement. Rather like Andy Murray overheating at Wimbledon (I'm predicting the future. He's actually about to play in the thunderstorm currently threatening SW19), our trusty tv control station needs an icepack and a fan.

Beside the cucumbers is a block of red leicester cheese. It is the second one I've bought in two days and says something significant about recent developments in our house. Last week we went on holiday for four days to house-sit for Tom's mum, and we spent the week working on The Decision. We went backwards and forwards, saying 'yes', then 'no', then 'yes' again, like Freddie in a particularly contrary mood. Then on Monday Tom made the call that sealed our fate: he rang Leicester University to accept the post of Lecturer of Computer Science, starting on 1st September this year. But we are not moving from Cambridge. Tom is going to commute weekly, renting a room there (hopefully in a kind old lady's house or some such setting) to work in during the week, and coming home at the weekends. It'll be a really tough wrench for all of us, but long discussions seemed to indicate that this was the best option. A brilliant career move for Tom, and the space and time to do all his evening work without a yelling monkey demanding his time and disrupting his sleep every night (we still get nightly visits and much wriggling beside us in bed). I'm going to use it as an excuse to try to lick Freddie into shape, when he can't play me and Tom off against each other, and when he discovers that with just Mummy around during the week, it's simply too boring to stay up beyond 8pm. Or this is the hope, anyway!

In honour of this momentous life change, I have finally booked our Willow Foundation Special Treat that we meant to take last year when I was still under the major treatment. I'm rather glad we left it till now, though, as we'll really be able to enjoy it, without any unshiftable weariness or nausea to fight off whilst doing it. We are booked into a posh hotel in Leicester, for a night in a family room (a room for us, with an adjoining bunk bed heaven for Freddie), plus breakfast and then £150 to spend on supper, drinks and snacks. Woooppeeee! Can't wait. I know it's Leicester, which everyone's been raising their eyebrows to, accompanied by mutters of 'I don't think you'll like it there', or 'Not the pleasantest town...' etc. But that's why we're not actually going to be based there. But as a welcome weekend to set us all off in the right direction, with Freddie having good associations with it (think: Space Centre to visit - he's robot and spaceship obsessed at the moment), wonderful curry houses for Tom to tick off on his curry tour list, and the hotel right by the station and the university for checking out where he's going to work and, hopefully, live. Yeehaa, it's only taken me nine months to organise, but I've finally sorted our Willow weekend. And thank you, Willow girl Hayley and her team for getting on to it the day I rang. She's booking and paying for our train trip there and everything. We just have to get ourselves to Cambridge station and the rest is laid on for us.

On the subject of last year's events, nobody much is keen to join me on the Pink Aerobics session in Regent's Park in September. Humph. I'll send out another email. Or reconsider, especially as weekends in Cambridge will be precious now with Tom and Freddie. Maybe another pink party of some description here would be better...

Freddie the other day did something really touching. We were sitting at the dining table eating lunch and all of a sudden, apropos of nothing, he said 'Mummy got breast cancer'. I said 'Yes, darling, I had breast cancer last year, but now I'm all better.' And then I realised why he might think I was still ill because I take pills twice a day and sometimes he has to witness me doing it because I can't persuade him to go into another room and I need them just before I eat breakfast. But don't worry, I've taught him that they would make him very sick if here were to even consider trying to eat one himself. 'Not Freddie's medicine!' he says, 'Mummy's medicine! Make Freddie very sick!'. That's right. Our conversation continued as we munched on homemade sarnies. 'What's breast cancer, Mummy?' said our little man. 'It's when Mummy had a hurt breast and the doctor took it away,' I said. 'Yeees,' said Freddie, all eager and nodding like he thoroughly understood. 'And the doctor gave Mummy very strong medicine but now she's better.' 'Yeeees.' 'But now she takes medicines every day just to stop the breast cancer coming back.' Oh dear, how do you explain preventative medicine to a two and a half year old? Mummy's not ill now. The next line out of his little mouth was accompanied by an emphatic pointing finger - 'Now, when you are sick, you ring the doctor!' 'Yes, darling, we'll ring the doctor,' I said, and this little fellow's curiosity and childlike concern took my breath away.

Listen out for those thundercracks tonight, people in the UK!

lots of love
Kirstyxx