Steve's health deteriorated very quickly after New Year and he died in hospital on Thursday 20th January.  He was a unique and special man and I feel very grateful to have known him for what was unfortunately such a short time.

It seems far too early to post a tribute type message, indeed I suspect that once I start to delve into the depths of his laptop I may find something he prepared earlier!

Funeral arrangements have now been made, everyone (except ex wives) is very welcome to join us in celebrating Steve's life, please email steve.newson@gmail.com for details.

Well, it's gotten to Saturday evening already and I have not written a single word for my journal. I guess that says something about the week, what is says to me mainly is that I have been unable to find the energy to be capable of writing anything down. Monday involved a bunch of chores, most importantly getting the car fitted with new tyres, the old ones were beginning to look worn and this isn't the weather to be driving on marginal tread. Had a nice visit from another old Post Office colleague from my later years with Parcelforce and the hand held scanner project. I should try and find some org charts from the time period. Actually that's a great piece of advice if you are starting out... keep the org charts which kind of represent your career and the relationship with key colleagues. Trust me, when you try to have the "do you remember what's his name from accounts" later in life you"ll thank me. And don't rely on what you currently think of as your cast iron memory, it will eventually let you down and you'll be doing the same kind of research I have been doing recently. LinkedIn might eventually take the place of retaining those old org charts or phone lists - assuming you connect with all your colleagues as you move from role to role.

On Wednesday I was supposed to travel to Maidenhead for a do, but I had already figured out on Monday or so that I was not up to the round trip. I could have made the trip in, but would almost immediately have needed to sleep. Thursday and Friday passed me by in a cycle of pain, morphine, fatigue and sleep. It took until late Friday to feel like I had the right balance of medication / timing.

I feel a little unsettled by the fact that the underlying level of morphine I am currently taking is higher than what I have been on previously and worried if I have reached a point where I will always suffer this level of pain and the issue has become managing this level of pain. The problem is I know the level of pain can be controlled but at a level of morphine which won't give me much in terms of awake time. You have to factor into this equation that my body is getting used to the morphine and so it will be taking more morphine now to control an unchanged level of pain. It’s not an easy equation.

I’d like to take a moment here for a shout out to a fellow lung cancer sufferer, Jonathan Piper, who is raising funds for the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation via a climb of Mont Blanc next year. His blog is at... http://everydayamountain.blogspot.com/

I do think Pamela Stephenson should have won Strictly Come Dancing, but it was not to be.

My journal this week is particularly downbeat and reads a bit like a “I did this then I did that” dreary monologue. I could summarise the week by saying it’s had it’s up and downs with the cloud of fatigue still hanging over me. It hasn’t been quite as bad as it reads. For those who are gluttons for punishment; here is the complete journal for last week...

Journal for Monday 6th December

Not one of my better nights sleepwise. I don’t feel too bad for the lack of sleep but it will mean my sleep cycle is all to pot for a day or so. I must try to sort it as early as possible or it’s impacts will roll on and before you know it I’ll find it’s the weekend again with nothing to show for the passage of the week.

The day dragged a bit in my usual fatigue style stupor. What a waste. My time is precious and it’s dripping through my fingers.

Tuesday 7th December

I have spent the day building and launching a website. The last time I did something like that was when I got my first PC at home, a Gateway 2000. I signed up with a ISP who no longer exists today but their package gave me a couple of email addresses and importantly some webspace. I taught myself the basics of hand coding HTML and launched a site. Today it would get laughed at. Anyway, fast forward to here and now and I have built the shell of a website with four static pages which will be at www.stevenewson.com (and www.stevenewson.co.uk ). I’ve also pointed my posterous blog at the website domain so the blog is at blog.stevenewson.com

For those that follow me by other means don’t panic, nothing has changed.

In the evening it was time to go and see my consultant for a post chemotherapy and CT scan review. There was a mixed bag of news. On the good news front the lung cancer and bone cancer are currently under control and responding appropriately to the chemotherapy. The news of the liver cancer was not so good. The liver cancer “spots” have become slightly larger and more defined. The plan is to have Christmas, get a scan at the end of January and see what the liver cancer is doing at that point. The consultant told me that he is considering prescribing a drug called Tarceva which has had some good results. It’s a pill based chemotherapy, so it avoids being wired up to bags of fluid for 24 hours which is really good news from my point of view. The common side effects are a skin rash and diahorrea. I feel quite positive about the news. Yes, it could have been better but it wasn’t really dreadfully bad news. I’m encouraged about the Tarceva because I have met someone on that drug at the lung cancer support group and he had had extraordinary good results from it. Whilst the same may not happen for me, as always when you are in my position, you will take any bit of a result you can get.

Went to Pizza Hut on the way back and enjoyed a Pepperoni feast.

Wednesday 8th December

Back pain isn’t helping things at the moment. I slept well last night, although in what I would call tranches. A few hours sleep then awake, sometimes just to turnover or go to the loo, sometimes needing to get up and stretch and have a cup of tea. Had an extra tranche at about 9:30 am and the next thing I knew it was almost noon.

Having been stuck in the house when on my own for a few weeks and certainly since the snow started it felt good to get out today, if only to go round to the chemists and pick up some medicines and to little Tesco.

Thursday 9th December

Another day that disappeared to a haze of fatigue.

Friday 10th December

Had a visitor for Twitter training in the morning which i think went well. Slept a bit in the afternoon. Crashed out in front of the TV for the evening.

Saturday 11th December

Went shopping in Highcross in Leicester. Think I am all set for Christmas now with cards and presents. Thirteen days before the big event. This is unheard of territory for me, but I like the feeling of control. I am sure things still have the capacity to go wrong, and knowing my luck it’s just a matter of time before the next bit of bad news hits me, but I will definitely enjoy the feeling whilst it lasts.

The X Factor went pretty much the way I would have liked and forecast but not the way many armchair commentators have been saying that it would. So many people seem to think that Cher was going to win, but lo and behold, that’s not going to happen. She was more gracious in defeat than I expected given some of her recent diva style behaviour.

Sunday 12th December

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows Part One. Versus sleep. Sleep won, so I did fall nod off a couple of times and, so I’m told, I snored. Bet that was popular! And probably accounts for the bruised ribs from getting poked (I’m joking!).

I very nearly wasn't right with my X Factor predictions. Rebecca put up a great fight for the top slot and at one stage I thought she might have done enough to knock Matt off the podium with her winners single which I thought was a much more iconic vocal and a fantastic performance. But all the speculation is over and my 1, 2, 3 has come good. I should have had money on it at the bookies but to be honest that's I thought I always have afterwards rather than before. Just as well, my Dad was a bit of a small time gambler and it never really paid off for him. Given my addictive personality style getting into gambling might have been the road to ruin for me.

I spent a good part of yesterday "virtually" attending the Social Recruiting Conference. A conference that actually eats it's own dog food in the sense that being all about social media it makes effective use of social media tools to reach out beyond the audience of people able to attend the conference in person. A really well organised event from what I could see on the streaming video, kudos to Social Recruiter of Crexia and to Alan Whitford of RCEuro. The main takeaways from the presentations I saw was "finally" some case studies about the ROI of using social media in recruitment....

(1) 65% of EA Games hires globally come through Social Media 

(2) SAB MIller has saved between £1.2-£1.8m through direct sourcing with social media

(3) At Deloitte NL, 3 people hired directly via Twitter in one year and 18 via Linkedin. Aim to be first organisation in Netherlands to kill use of job boards. 

I didn't make it all the way through till the end of the day; so I am sad that I didn't get to see Bill Boorman on the closing panel but I understand there is a boxset of CD's being made available for purchase sometime soon. I'm pretty sure details will be available at the RCEuro website (www.rceuro.com). I'm looking forward to reading some of the blog output from today too.

A busy day for me. I just wish the vomiting would stop. It's got to the stage where I'm questioning the value of the sixth chemotherapy session. I was in the best shape I have been since diagnosis just before the sixth round and right now I feel like crap. I know the conventional wisdom is that the side effects are cumulative so I should give it at least four weeks, and probably five weeks, before I start to question the recovery but I am just so fed up with it. In my heart of hearts I know that the sixth chemotherapy session will have bought me more than the two or three weeks it is costing me now but I reserve the right to be pissed off about how long it's taking me to get back on an even keel if it's all the same to you. 

I've cooked today for the first time in ages and by cooking I mean started with ingredients rather than something from a packet or can. It's only a mince stew and dumplings but it's a massive step forward for me. The only fear is that my stomach will let me down. Time will tell.

A visit today from two of my oldest friends. I go all the way back to my first days in the Post Office in London, some 25 years ago, to recall my first encounters with Stuart & Ruth. One way or another my career was closely linked with Stuart throughout my 14 years with the Post Office. It was great to catch up with them, neither of them seem to have changed that much since I first met them. They are wonderful people and great friends.

The fatigue is really hard to cope with this time. I have quite short bursts of energy; typically first thing in the morning, then around lunchtime, then around teatime / early evening. What this means though is that I'm sleeping late morning and again early afternoon for a couple of hours each time. I'm enjoying the periods when I am awake and able to do a bit of work even if it's a bit of housework or walking the dogs or whatever but I'm frustrated by the periods of sleep.

A frustrating day with my Sky TV installation. Recordings have been covered in interference for a couple of days and the box has started switching itself off at random times. Also some channels are reporting that the box has no satellite signal whilst others seem to be fine. I did a bit of trouble shooting after some research on the net and then soldiered through a call with technical support. I don't know why these people can't accept that you have already done some of the checks they want you to perform. I know the argument is that they have procedures to follow but frankly that is exactly what is wrong with customer service in this country. If you don't empower your front line to resolve problems to the satisfaction of the customer then you are asking for trouble. If you set up a regime of fear where your front line is instructed to follow a set of procedures which they circumvent at their peril then don't expect your customer service to be rated very highly. Yes, you may have high closure rates on cases, but with due respect, you are measuring the wrong thing.

My stomach is slightly better and the fatigue marginally better. My left thigh is aching from a fall on Tuesday morning. It didn't bother me yesterday but today it is aching quite badly. It was so bad it forced me to return home after about 250 yards of my walk today. Very bored with life at the moment but realise I am not too far away from being able to do a few things, hopefully.

It feels like lots of waiting for things to drop into place at the moment. Unfortunately for me, waiting equals boredom. Boy does the mood round here need to change a bit. I want the old upbeat me back so badly I could scream. 

Not a bad nights sleep. I went to bed quite early and as a consequence I woke up the first time quite early. I was uncomfortable and didn't quite know what to do with myself. I tried sleeping on my right side, which I haven't been able to do in months and managed about three hours of deep sleep, after which having had the relief, I was able to sleep again on my more usual left side. An interesting development, will have to try that again.

After a bit of light at the end of the tunnel, the train emerged and hit me full on this morning. Fatigue, vomiting, falling asleep in my chair. My mood is slightly better but my physical condition is not matching, at least so far. Had some pretty weird dreams last night and to be honest I think because I worked through some bad news stuff in my sleep that's what has helped towards the lifting mood today. Time will tell if it's the start of a more upbeat me coming back into play. I have a CT scan on Monday. I was going to attempt to go on my own but the bad weather is encouraging a more conservative approach and the need to be helped.

Fell asleep about 11am, woke up at 2pm. We went shopping for food, a good trip round Tesco but ran out of steam almost immediately after.

The X Factor is getting down to the wire now. This weekend and two more to go. No reason on the basis of tonight to fundamentally revise my predictions. Wagner to go please. Matt to win, my only fear is his song choices are geared towards the older end of the audience, but boy can he sing. Rebecca, a truly talented vocalist, to come second. My fear for Rebecca is that nerves will overtake her. Cher or One Direction to come third. The eviction tomorrow should be Wagner but I'm guessing the tactical voting is still in place. Therefore Mary & Katie to be the bottom two. Mary to go home.

Having had the pop at the Sky Call Centre, let me by contrast, offer praise to the Sky Engineer who came round to fix the problem. Within minutes he'd decided to replace the box, accepting on face value the problems that we outlined, and within about 15 minutes the new box was installed and we were good to go. It will be nice to have the TV back to normal.

I was right about the bottom three in the X Factor, but wrong about the order. Katie, knocked out immediately, gave a gracious little farewell. Much more to her than Aiden who got his knickers in a twist when he was voted off. I'm guessing the judges will now vote to dump Wagner unless they are scared of the fallout (retribution) from the judging public. 

Well done, the judges didn't bottle it, so Wagner has finally gone. I'm surprised that Simon commented on the theory that tactical voting has been happening, that might come back to bite him!

I need to start thinking more about Xmas. Have the approximate shape of my plans but need to start to firm these up a bit further. It feels like it's too early but it's sure to come round really fast now. 

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