All Alone in Space and Time
At the time of writing I have complete 14 of 20 fractions of radiotherapy; to the best of my knowledge it is going well. The side-effects, principally tiredness, come and go and I just have to go with them. I’ve learned that Bluetooth and earbuds are the solution to TV noise in the waiting room. I have many playlists and sometimes particular songs bring joy. Pet Shop Boys are always a cert, and three others are posted at the end of this. Most days the actual time under the beam is around 90 seconds, although once every week they also do a scan to check everything looks good.
Early in the week I took time to go to a couple of local gyms to check prices and also to ask if instructors were OK to work out a programme focused on recovery from the impact of the hormones and the radiotherapy – primarily addressing potentially reduced muscle mass and possible issues with bone density (although prescription calcium/vitamin D supplements should have helped with that.) As the androgen inhibition impacts of the hormones wears off I can build in cardio, I think. The key is not to be heroic, just to do some focused work. I get a heavily discounted rate with the local authority gym through MacMillan Cancer Care, though the private gym is the nicer (and closer) facility. Probably I’ll use the cheaper options while I can, then reconsider.
One of the books I read in the waiting room and at home was William Gibson’s Neuromancer (pub. 1984) It is justly seen as a formative work in modern SF and you can pretty much see the future being written, although as ever what is a warning about a techno dystopia seems to have been taken as a blueprint and call to action by the tech industry. It functions as a novel by being a fast-paced caper thriller presented in what was then a novel setting (the term cyberspace comes from it) using tech neologisms. I enjoyed it and can understand why it is so well regarded, but it will go back to the charity shop I got it from.
In TV viewing, after a shaky start Star Trek: Star Fleet Academy delivered what I thought were two decent episodes in episodes 4 and 5. I gave up on Star Trek: Discovery during its third season for several reasons, one of which was its tendency to inspiring speeches. The first three episodes of Academy leaned into this with ‘teachable moments’ delivered with that aura of cloying, earnest sentimentality that is uniquely American. Episodes 4 and 5 succeeded by largely dispensing with that and were much the better for it.
In the meantime, I took the opportunity of rewatching all of the TV adaptation of Deborah Harkness’s A Discovery of Witches. I think I’ve mentioned before that I very much prefer the books and had problems with the way the narrative was compressed for TV. In fairness, I enjoyed it more in this binge watch, albeit that I fast-forwarded through some scenes. As I’m avoiding anything particularly intellectually challenging I may read the books again. That isn’t to disrespect the books which I enjoy and are layered, but they’re not Pynchon. Of the five so far published the first three are by far the strongest, however I’ll give Prof Harkness a pass because she too was public about her encounters with cancer.
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