Seeing the World

With my flight into Belfast less than 24 hours away, I thought I’d better pack my bag and, more importantly, pre-programme my international sat-nav.

Not trusting my sense of direction, not understanding how to use google maps offline  and refusing to pay £12 a day to rent a sat nav my piece of kit is a highly value £38 investment from Amazon that I take overseas every time I intend to drive.

On the whole it’s pretty good.  It warns me if I’m breaking the speed limit.  It’s fairly easy to plan routes in advance and it tells me where to go, as so many other people have over the years.

My driving style overseas is one of total and utter concentration on the road ahead.  I’m not one to gaze out across the prairies unless I’m in the only car on the highway.  Look at signs?  Hell no I might hit the SUV in front!  So I tend to rely on passengers to help and in their absence the sat nav.

It usually works, but not always.

Last year’s Yellowstone adventure was its first challenge.  On one leg across Colorado it turned a straight forward three hour drive into a six hour journey simply by not realising I’d gone the wrong way.  It did recalculate the route so at some point 200 miles away it would have looped us back round, but that would have made the journey ten hours.  Not good as my back pain peaked on that trip!

Its ability to predict journey time is also deeply flawed.  But somewhere in the settings I assume this can be fixed.  Alas, having pressed around 326 different permutations in those settings it still has no idea how to predict arrival time to within 50% accuracy.

Last month’s Montenegran adventure was a complete fail.  As I eagerly clambered into my Citroen with expensive wing mirrors I discovered a significant issue.  No USB connector to charge it up.  And I’d left the cigarette charger and aux cable at home in the name of travelling light.  Doh.

So as I head out onto the happy roads of the north bit of the Emerald Isle tomorrow afternoon I’ll keep my fingers crossed that my pre-programmed destinations of Titanic museum, restaurant in Belfast, hotel in Antrim, Giant’s Causeway and my £35 a night B&B are found without drama.

Here’s hoping.

I wonder if I can park for free on a Belfast street?

Spending Less Than £60 to Earn £225 Worth of Avios

I tend to use Avis when hiring a car.  They’re not necessarily cheapest but I have “preferred” membership which is free, entitles me to queue jump and often ends in an upgraded vehicle too.

This status combined with multiple rentals has also got me a free weekend car hire in Europe between now and next March.  While receipt of this quite excited me, I’ve still got no idea when I’m going to utilise it.  If I can find cheap flights to Aberdeen or Inverness to do the North Coast 500 or hop down to Newquay for three days in Cornwall it might even get used in the UK.

Iberia, the Spanish Airline, appear to have come up with an offer where I can get better than free car hire.  It’s quite exciting.  Hire a car at a weekend and get 9,000 Avios.  Base value of those is £50 when redeemed for hotel or car hire.  My first class flights to Boston have squeezed 2.5p per Avios out of my points so make this offer worth £225 in some cases.

Given that my three days in Northern Ireland next week involves paying £41 for the car (Malta cost me £15) there’s a case for finding a weekend in May or June to hire a car, do nothing with it and collect a bonus that I can cash in for a not insubstantial value.

Dublin, Belfast and Inverness would all do me a three day qualifying car hire for less than £60.  Not dissimilar in certain other parts of Europe too.

Now I just need to work out what weekends, if any, I can take advantage of this offer for.  It seems way too generous!  Alternatively head to Leeds or Manchester, pay £70 for a car for three days and not use it.  There’s still a profit to be had!

What Were My Cancer Symptoms?

It never crossed my mind that I had cancer.  While it might be helpful for others to know what, in retrospect, I realise were key moments of the cancer spread, it’s highly likely that your GP wouldn’t refer you for a scan.

February 2016 I experienced the faintest chest growling if I lay on my front.  Very slightly different to the minor cough I’d had since having my tonsils out in 2008.  I did nothing.

It only crossed my mind last week that another sign of the illness also struck me in February 2016.  I played badminton for the first time in 35 years and went for it big time.  Enthusiastic is an understatement!  A painful shoulder ensued.  Over the following week it spread across the whole of my upper chest with severe pain and swelling.

Being a man I took paracetamol and ibuprofen and didn’t trouble the doctor.  I assumed it was a sporting injury.  With hindsight, it’s ridiculous to think using my left shoulder could damage the right side of my chest in such a way.  But even if I had got an A* cancer investigation and diagnosis at that stage I was still done for.  It had spread.  Stage four lung cancer patients simply don’t live long.

While the bulk of that pain went away, three months later I experienced a strange sizzling sensation in my upper back.  It was odd, but strangely pleasant.  I ended up with a spot on my back where the sizzle was and thought nothing of it.  Indeed, that pleasant sizzle continued inside, albeit mildly, until I started the afatinib pills.  Strange how something so deadly can actually feel pleasant.

Not soon after the first sizzle I got upper back pain.  My GP said it was muscular, unusual to get it in my mid-upper back and prescribed Cocodamol.  Off I trotted.  Attending work events in my new team in genuine discomfort.  Worrying that they’d think the new guy was a demic.  The pain diminished a little over time.

Then the lower back pain began.  I just have a slipped disc, surely?  I rang BUPA who, after a length telephone questionnaire, referred me to a physiotherapist.  Sciatica shooting down my right leg.  Real agony. The treatment included lots of thigh rubbing, pins being stuck into muscles and a prescription of thirty minutes a day of specific exercises at home.  While it worked at softening the agony for a time the major pains usually returned before the next session.

A July driving holiday was severely inhibited by the pain, but I still managed some decent walks with Chris, the soothing effect of white water rafting and a day soaking in thermal hot springs.  But my pain was pretty constant throughout.

On session eight, my physiotherapist told me to ring BUPA and tell them things weren’t working.  And she was right.  A subsequent MRI scan of my lower back displayed dead bone in L4 and L5 vertebrae.  It’s now September.  The neurologist guessed wrongly at myeloma.  Blood cancer.  That scared me.  It would have been a hell of a lot more friendly than effing lung cancer though!

It wasn’t until I finally got to my NHS oncologist in November that they told me ribs, lymph nodes, several verterba, pelvis, sacrem and other bits I can’t recall were goosed.  As spreads go, my body had been impeccable.  Great effort Dave!

Early MRI investigations would have got me treatment faster.  What I’ll never know is if I’d got treatment and that had limited the spread, would that increase life expectancy?  I don’t think even the experts know.  And for me I suppose it doesn’t really matter.  It is what it is.  Live before it finishes you off.

How The National Trust and English Heritage Might Not Be a Force For Good

I’ve previously bought into the concept that these operations are good for preserving the nation’s valuable sites.  They charge a fee, you get in, they allocate the spend to maintenance.

After paying close to £10 to wander around Whitby Abbey a few weeks back, I began to question my belief systems.  It’s an impressively located ruin high above the seaside town.  But I got the impression that it didn’t really need an entry fee to maintain it.  It felt like I was effectively paying a tenner to cover the cost of running a shop which didn’t even provide toilet facilities.  They went hard sell on an annual membership though.

Stonehenge is an interesting one too.  £15 allowed us to park up, hop on the bus and see some old rocks.  I loved it.  And when I’d seen it as a child it had graffiti on some of the stones.

So I’m thinking I’m paying a jot not insubstantial sum for some basic security to protect the sites and a bus relay service because they didn’t fancy putting the car park closer.  I loved the place but couldn’t escape the fact you get the best view for free from the A303!

Ahead of my trip to the top bit of the Emerald Isle I’ve researched the Giants Causeway.  £10.50 to get into the National Trust visitor centre.  Public right of way to get down to the hexagonal stones themselves – free – or £1 if you pay Danny Boy to hop on his Land Rover.  So what am I paying over ten quid for?  I can walk around it!

I will probably apply a little more thought to the cost of paying to go into a shop to buy fridge magnets and whether or not this money is used charitably to protect our national treasures.  Maybe I’ve got it wrong.

But if you end up paying £10-£15 to help Lord Richbloke avoid inheritance tax so that his family can carry on living in a stately home while a few visitors pay to admire the gardens and a few downstairs rooms that are too expensive to heat, well it doesn’t seem quite right.

Maybe I’ve just woken up extra cynical this morning.

My Swimming With Snakes Dream

No, I don’t mean like some people with dolphins.  I mean I’ve just had a dream about swimming with snakes!  It’s my second quite vivid dream in recent weeks.  The last one with the lions was quite interesting.

The snake was supposedly a boa constrictor in a large pool, one of many.  Although it looked like the water moccasin in the picture.  It was showing me around Brisbane.  Even though in reality it was just swimming around the pool in a large circle, at high speed, with me keeping up with it.

Not aggressive towards me.  I wasn’t frightened by it but despite chasing it I kept my distance deliberately.  At the end of the tour it turned around, looked at me and made a graceful up and down movement in the water before I woke up.

—

Dream Meaning #2: Snakes in water as symbols of emotional healing

If you are comfortable in the water and the snake’s behavior is friendly or neutral, it means that you are at peace with your emotions. The presence of the snake could indicate that you are healing emotional wounds or dealing with a situation that’s potentially challenging with ease.

The Man From American Express (AXA to be precise) Said Yes

After last week’s disaster when a stationary wheelie bin came out of nowhere to decapitate my Montenegran hire car wing mirror and lumbered me with a €225 bill I have good news.

Just four days after submitting the claim for the excess against my posh American Express Platinum Card the assessor with AXA has agreed to pay me back.

While it shouldn’t be a surprise, as the damage caused was pretty much what they claimed to cover, there’s always that little niggle that makes you wonder if you’ve failed on a technicality such as an address mismatch or a failure to submit a car hire document long since left behind in a foreign land.

So, I’m happy.  I’m reimbursed in full.  I’m thinking that my fee for the multi benefit charge card has been money well spent and fingers crossed my desire to drive overseas isn’t diminished.

The Icing on the Cake

Saturday night was a fun occasion for my love of freebies, bargains and occasional luxury.  Our free night at the Hilton got upgraded to a full blown Rock star friendly butler button pressing massive suit with a minimum retail value in excess of £2,000.

It’s fair to say that appealed to me.  I like free.  I like upgrades.  I like suites.  There’s not a hope in hell I’d ever have paid over £150 for a room in London so to get this was pretty remarkable.

I also read with interest reports that Barclaycard might be stopping the Hilton card too and another company taking on the contract.  This is great news if true as it means I can meet another minimum spend challenge and get another free night out of Hilton if the terms and conditions are similar.

Of course, one of the downsides of utilising a freebie is that you don’t earn loyalty points.  Nil spend = nil points.  It’s a fair and understandable trade off and one that has had me doing quick calculations in my head on whether I’m best redeeming points or paying cash.  Not always a straight forward equation.

I’d completely forgotten about a promotion I’d clicked on with Hilton though.  Email invitation, register here (on the off chance) and then don’t use is my usual style.  It never crossed my mind that utilising a freebie would trigger “2,000 bonus points for every night you stay”.

A little bit of shock combined with an internal whoop as an email arrived in the early hours telling me I had indeed been awarded 2,000 points for the free stay in their second poshest suite.

It gives me a buzz.  I’ve played the game, got a result and then been treated further for it.  The value of the points is probably less than £10 but it feels great!

This is almost better than anything that hooker might have had to offer!

Over 50s Life Cover

The bad news is that I’m only 49 and can’t have one of these yet.  When the job ends on 31st May my death in service benefit will end.  The critical illness policy has already paid off the mortgage.  In other words I’m worth nothing extra when I go!

But with daytime TV packed with over-50 life assurance plan adverts my exploitative mind is ticking away.

No medical questions asked.  Good news for those of us that are medically compromised.

Premiums refunded if you check out within 12 months (or 24 months with Parky’s lot).  So it’s heads you win, tails you get your money back.  £75 retail gift cards at some places too!

Cover is basically priced at around 20/1 that a fifty year old taking out the policy will die within any particular year after taking the policy out.

It’s pretty terrible value for the healthy middle aged man.  For a bloke with a terminal illness like mine it’s an absolute gift and I can’t see a catch, unless I live for an unexpectedky long time.  I get the benefit of extra direct debits to gain benefits on various bank accounts.  The kids inherit more.

Roll on January when I can take multiple plans out!

Half of Those Diagnosed at the Same Time I Was Are Now Dead

Stage four lung cancer is a pretty rapid killer for most people diagnosed.  A third gone after three months.  A half gone after six months.  I’m now at six months and while I’m not exactly punching the air with joy I am feeling lucky.

It becomes clearer by the day that between June and November last year I was a dead man walking.  Immense back pain.  Physiotherapy.  No cancer treatment.  I  might not even have made Christmas.

At the point of diagnosis last November I was aware of the average survival rate after diagnosis being just six months, not that the oncologist would tell me.  The way the football season was going at the time that might even have been welcome, although things picked up a little on both health and sporting fronts.

The genetic mutation that caused my cancer was generous enough to be a nicer form of lung cancer than most others get.  One that responds to the drug that was prescribed a month after diagnosis.  I suppose that’s my reward for being a non-smoker.  The afatinib is only likely to give me a couple more years or so, but that sort of timespan is excellent for focusing the mind on good stuff, while the niggling thought of dying takes a back seat.  There is always the fear I might not make it to the next holiday!

So on I go within my new reality.  No job.  Mobile to a point, but so much less so than a year ago.  Cash to treat myself with.  Despite a mindset that still demands value.  Knowing I’ve just beaten “average” for surviving this disease.  Knowing that above average isn’t close to being a promise of reaching old age.  And then fearing my pension pot will run out if I get very old, however unlikely that scenario is.

My Pension Condundrum