My appointment was at Redcliffe Hospital at the specialist outpatient clinic which to me sounds really imposing to begin with. I arrived appropriately early and went through all of the things you have to do to sign in and register as being there to see the doctor. Obviously my Medicare card wouldn’t swipe through the automated check in system so I had to go to the window and speak to a human. She got me all checked in and sent me off to the “purple” waiting room. I took a seat and waited. And waited. And waited some more.

I had been chewing some gum and while I was waiting it reached that stage where it had no more flavour and I was just chewing a wad of sticky horrible shit. I started wondering what I was going to do with it as there were a few people waiting there with me and I wasn’t going to just jam it under the seat. Just as I noticed a big bin on the other side of the hall one of the many doors opened and I heard the call of “Mr Saltmarsh?”. I walked to the door and casually flipped my gum off into the bin with style. Off to a good start.

I went in and the doctor insisted on calling me Mr Saltmarsh even after I reminded him that my name was Sir, but I thought I’d let it slide. I sat down and we got down to business.

The doctor had my referral and test results in front of him as I sat down and his first comment and question threw me for a spin straight away. He said something along the lines of “So I see your doctor ordered three occult blood stool samples, but I have no idea really why he did that…”. He said it with the tone of a question as if he was asking me if I knew why I’d had that test done. He said “Is it because your blood count was a bit low?”. I told him that was correct, that because my blood count was a percentage of a percentage below the minimum ‘normal’ count he did the test to see if I was losing blood that way.

He asked me if I had had any other symptoms or problems with my bowels or bowel movements or stomach or anything to which I answered in the negative. He asked about my family history with bowel cancer, to which the only relative I know who had it was my grandma.

He explained a bit about the occult blood test and how it’s done to check for blood when blood isn’t visible to the naked eye, and thus it’s a very sensitive test. He said that the fact that only one of my samples had come back positive was a good sign and that because my known family history wasn’t immediate, I’d had no other symptoms or problems at all and the fact that I’m only 32 all works in my favour. This is where it gets good.

He said that while he can’t say it’s nothing, because young people with no symptoms DO get bowel cancer, he said that all of the facts of the case that he can see from where we’re at right now lead him to be very very positive about it and he said that he would be “very surprised” if the colonoscopy showed up anything “sinister”.

I swear if you had seen me sitting there you would have seen my shoulders un-slump some as if you could see the gigantic weight of stress being lifted off my shoulders.

He said that he would absolutely still aggressively investigate it and go ahead with the colonoscopy as soon as possible. So I should expect to have it done within the next four to six weeks. I’ll have to go in for an appointment before I get it done where the nurses will explain to me what will happen on the day and give me everything I need to prepare my body. I’m dreading this part a little bit actually.

From what I understand there’s a whole load of horrible liquid that you have to drink that basically makes you shit out the entire inside of your body. You do that the day/night before so that on the day of the procedure your bowels are completely empty.

A couple of things made me laugh. One was when he was explaining the colonoscopy he said that they “take a long thin METAL…wait no…not metal, I meant to say flexible…tube with a camera on it.”. Whew!

The second thing was on the consent forms I had to sign for the procedure, it had a list of all of the side effects and unlikely complications that could occur during it. It was so thorough it even explained that I could get a “dead-arm” from laying on my side for ages haha. I actually laughed out loud in there when I read that.

So that’s where I’m at. I feel a lot less stressed about it all. Obviously there’s still some stress because it could still be something horrible, but the specialist has put my mind somewhat at ease with his positivity which has done a lot of goodness for my head. My mental health was also helped a lot the other day by visiting the baby animal farm. Check this blog to check out a video full of cuteness.

I’ll keep this blog updated with all this as it happens. I wonder if I can get a copy of my colonoscopy on DVD? Anyone know?

It’s no secret that I absolutely LOVE animals and when I saw Natalie mention that she might be organising a baby animal zoo I was 100% committed to being there wherever it took place. I mean come on, it’s a bunch of baby animals running around that you can play with and feed! Who wouldn’t be excited about such a thing? I dare say anyone who wouldn’t love to just sit around in a park, on the grass and play with baby goats and piglets must be bereft of soul.

Kylie and I always talk about how we want to give some money to some animal charities but we never get around to doing it, so when this plan was put into action we figured we can put some money towards something that will help charity AND get to play with little piggies and goats and ducks and stuff. It was a win win situation!

I’m pretty sure I mentioned it after our last visit to Alma Park Zoo but it’s worth saying again. Animals really chill me out. There’s something great about interacting with animals and having that sort of connection with another living creature that just puts me in a really great frame of mind. So today was also a bit of a de-stress of me, much needed with what has been going on with my health lately. I will post another blog dealing with how my specialist appointment went last week when I get a chance.

So we arrived at the park today, said g’day to the Clumsy one and made our way to the animal enclosure. In there they had the following animals in baby form – Pigs, goats, sheep, a cow and chickens. They also had some grown up chickens and ducks that were floating around and a pony for kids to take rides on. You could buy a cup of feed as you went into the enclosure which we did and headed in.

Whilst in the enclosure I took some video with the GoPro Hero 2 which I have edited together with a rockin’ Toehider track from the Old, Old, Old EP from way back during 12in12.

Massive thanks and congratulations to Natalie for organising such an awesome event today. Charity + baby animals is an absolute winner. RSPCA Qld were also on hand today with information and a couple of awesome puppies that were available for adoption. I’m not sure if anyone took them up on that today or not though.

Anyway, enjoy the video and get your squee on!

I figure he’ll ask me questions about my bowel movements and how my insides are feeling and I was thinking about these things today and kept referring to said movements as “shits”. Shit is a word I use and have always used to describe what it is I do when I sit down on the toilet. Shit is generally considered to be a pretty tame swear word, but a swear word none the less.

When I picked up my sample jars for the stool samples I had to give, the woman at the pathology office said the word “poos”, which I really don’t like. When adults talk to me about “poo” I feel like they’re patronizing me or something. Almost like they’re talking to me and somehow I’m 7 years old.

I don’t use the word poo myself either, so that’s out of the question. Poop is the same, I wouldn’t use that word. Stools sounds too formal and like I think I’m trying to be a doctor, so I really don’t know what word to use at the doctors.

Is it OK to use the word shit to describe or talk about actual shit at the doctors? If I need to talk about how my shits have been is it alright for me to just talk about how my shits have been?

I know this must seem ridiculous right? This is how my brain is working right now. I actually got a bit stressed out about the whole thing.

It’s a bit crazy.

Tonight was pretty dark when we headed out and it’s Monday so everything down the road was shut. It’s always a bit creepy walking along down there on a Monday night. There’s hardly anyone around and the park is deserted so I get instantly suspicious and imaginative about the motives of anyone else I see walking around.

Tonight while we were at the half way mark having a drink and a chat some business looking dude come walking past us holding some sort of briefcase thing and headed off down the path towards our place. We started on our way home a short time behind him. After walking along for a little bit all of a sudden he come walking out of the darkness from the park, case still in hand and back onto the path and off again. What was he doing? There was a group of young looking people walking in the other direction along the path on the other side of the park, so I’m pretty sure he was selling them crack or something.

On the way home we come across a sign, on the back of which was a small Golden Orb was nesting in it’s web. GROSS. Oh god I fucking hate spiders. I’m now terrified that the spiders are going to be coming out and I’m going to be walking through their webs. That would be absolutely horrendous.

As we were approaching home waiting to cross the road to our place I was standing in what is essentially the bike lane of the street. A ute come burning around the corner, it’s tires squealing like crazy, I was actually a little worried it was going to lose it. Kylie yelled out to me “GET OFF THE ROAD!” like she was Frodo Baggins as it come flying past me. We started to cross the road right after it passed us and it came screeching to a halt just down the road a little bit and looked like it was doing a u-turn to come back our way. Kylie then blurted out “OH MY GOD IT’S LIKE DUEL!”. I love that girl so very much hah. Here’s the trailer for Duel.

Here’s a couple of photos from tonight. A texture and a gross spider!

Notes: Oh my god. Tonight’s walk wiped me out like crazy, I dunno what’s going on. It wasn’t the coolest night out and there was very little breeze coming off Moreton Bay, so maybe it was just hotter than usual and it took it out of me.

I also went down and back up the steep ramp part tonight, so I think that was a bit of extra strength sapping effort at the end.

I didn’t take any photos worth posting tonight and to be honest everything I’m taking seems to be the same old shit lately. I think I need to start trying some different stuff. I might try and start doing a series of texture photos. I had talked about doing that as part of Begrudgingly Trudging early on I think. That could be a cool plan.

Forget about that though because Kylie is fundraising again this year for The Cancer Council’s Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea! Last year we had a nice picnic in a park here in Redcliffe, but she’s doing things a little differently this year. I’ll leave that to her to explain though! If you want to donate you can do that right here.

Notes: Back at the walkies today! Last night my head was KILLING me when I got home, then the Homer Simpson in me started chasing a Cane Toad around the yard with my camera. I stopped when he hopped through the fence and was hit by a blasting headache 10 times worse. So had a night off.

Today we did the 2km route because we spent half the day walking around a couple of Westfields and were pretty knackered from so much consumerism.

Oh hey, so going back to the toad thing, here’s a short fun video I made with the only bit of footage I could get of the actual toad because it was so dark. I’ve smashed the exposure so hard in this that it’s desaturated and gone all grainy and rad. Looks like a late night film clip on Rage from the 90s.

Walk was nice tonight. Not very breezy but not overly warm. Kylie’s breaking in some cool new New Balance walking shoes so she took a bit of a break in the park to give them a bend and try and soften the heel parts. I powered to the end of the road and come back to pick her up. I snapped a photo of her lookin’ all cute and innocent on her break. Daw.

Still loving having the GoPro Hero 2 to carry around. I picked up the LCD back for it which has made framing for photos so much better. It’s a bit of a battery drain though.

Anyway here’s a couple of photos from Begrudgingly Trudging.

Notes: Did a shorter walk tonight. Have felt a bit terrible all day today. Spoke to the clinic where I have to go see the specialist to try and bring my appointment forward but can’t. I either have to take the appointment they’ve given me or get pushed back at least a month. Fuck that. I’ve managed to get in quickly because I’ve apparently been deemed as “urgent”, so I have to get it done. There’s a whole other blog in this, so look out for that later. My appointment is also right when I should be on a plane to Melbourne too, so I’ve had to cancel my trip which kinda bummed me out too.

Had a ticket for Jay and Silent Bob Get Old, the Kevin Smith and Jason Mewes show at The Tivoli tonight but sold my ticket earlier today. I couldn’t think of anything worse than being in a crowd of people tonight. Blerg.

We just headed down to the end of the shops and back tonight which is a pretty neat 2.0km spot on. It’s not epic, but it’s something at least.

I played with some more light trail photos tonight and shot a couple of cool textural shots of some cool dried sap on the outside of a tree.

Notes: Oh yeah. See that? No *! Awesome.

It was actually a little further than 3.0km, but like I suspected yesterday, the app I’m using stops at 2.99km when I have the goal set to 3.0km for some reason which makes no sense to me. Maybe I need to set my goal to 3.01km just so I can see 3.okm on the screen!

A lot of observations tonight. I had Kylie back with me again which was cool, but you’ll notice it added 6 minutes to my time. That’s because someone needs to buy some better shoes! You know who you are. So that was observation one. No matter how cute pink and silver sneakers may be, if they only cost $12 or something they’re probably not great for doing any great deal of walking in.

There were a lot of people out and about tonight and everyone was so friendly! It’s crazy. Usually I pass people but it’s like people who walk after work I think are usually people who can’t be arsed with getting up to do it in the morning. So they get home from work and make themselves go out and are usually surly and shut the world out and just trudge on until they’re done. Tonight though I think probably two in three people we passed said hello. It was cool.

Got out before the sun was down very far tonight so managed to get a couple of photos with at least some light in them.

As we were approaching the ramp to go down to the park by the beach there was a woman standing there with a poodle on a leash. The poodle was standing with it’s feet planted firmly into the grass and was staring us down as we approached. The old woman called out to us as we were approaching “Oh it’s OK…he just doesn’t like anyone walking behind him!”. Kylie and I both had a chuckle at it and headed down the path looking at this poodle who looked like he was so paranoid either of us were about to run up behind him and go for entry. Maybe something horrible had happened to him as a pup.

Anyway as we headed down the ramp we heard “See!” and turned to see the woman and her poodle, now relaxed and trotting along at her side as if nothing happened now that we weren’t on the path behind them. Crazy!

Something quite creepy happened on the way back. As we were coming along the road by the shops we saw a really creepy looking old man crossing the road leading a little boy to the park side of the road. He was, for some unknown reason, leading the small child into a dark area of the park where that big tree with green and blue lights is. My mind instantly screams PEDO, but as he was crossing our path, something happened where a cars headlights and the lamp light of the street came to cross in some eerie way that completely blacked out the shape of the man and the boy to a silhouette to us and the creepy old man complete with pointy evil face and fedora looked EXACTLY LIKE FREDDY KREUGER! It was crazy!

Creepy Freddy Kreuger pedo!

It was not long after that encounter that Kylie made the statement “Oh man I’m gonna be so proud of the blister I can feel forming on my foot!”. We went on to suggest names for it. My favourites were Blistersaurus Rex, Blistertron and Blist-Ra (a take on Mumm-ra). It does look like it could be quite epic. So new shoes are on the agenda for Kylie.

Oh yeah also, if you read my blog post Shrodinger’s Cancer -or- The QLD Public Health System Sucks, you’ll be happy to know I have received my specialist appointment offer. The only problem is that it’s 3 hours after I’m supposed to get on a plane to Melbourne. So I’ll be calling tomorrow to see if I can move it up a day or back six days. Hopefully sooner.

I took some more GoPro photos tonight, couple here, one more on Begrudgingly Trudging.

Notes: FUCK! Another *. But YEAH!!! Finally!

Tonight my dear walkies followers, I cracked 3km. I went further than I have before, right until the app said 1.5km which was quite a way further around the coast than I thought it would be. I went straight down the street today though so I think if I went earlier and took the path down by the beach it wouldn’t be as far because it’s much windier that way. But anyway, I did it!

Here’s my * explanation. So as I was getting close to the end of the 3km I kept checking the app like a dick. Anyway I looked at it at one stage and it said 2.99km but it wasn’t moving anymore and the clock had stopped. Now I’m pretty positive I didn’t hit the stop button because when you do that it brings up a prompt on whether or not you want to save, discard or cancel, so I wouldn’t have accidentally hit stop and then save. What I think might have happened is that because I have my walk goal in the app set to 3km, it must stop when you hit that mark. In my case I’m assuming it stopped at 2.99 instead of 3.0 for some wacky reason. Anyway, when I saw it had stopped at 2.99km I started it again, but it went back to 0km.

This was right near home though so by the time I got in the gate it had only gone to 0.10km, so I probably did a bit more than 3.10km tonight, but I’m just counting what’s on the clock. OK technically what’s on the clock should be 3.09km but go to hell! I’m taking the extra 0.1km and there’s nothing you can do about it!

When I got back in the door sweat was POURING out of me and I was super puffed, but in less than a minute I was pretty much recovered and feeling great!

It was pitch black when I went out tonight so my photos are in complete darkness, but I took them looking each way down the path at the 1.5km mark.

I think if I can handle doing walks in the dark during the week and then maybe try and get out earlier on the weekends for some late-afternoon-still-daylight walking that might be a good idea.

So here in all their dark and crappy glory are the two photos from my 1.5km mark tonight!

Notes: She’s back! My walkies partner in crime is back and we had our first walk together in a while tonight. It was cool. Except now instead of listening to Tell Em Steve-Dave, I’m listening to “Tell me how your day was”, “What happened at work?”, “I told you that bitch crazy!”. I kid though, it was great having Kylie for company again.

Did the good old tried and tested track down the beachfront and back up the street past all of the shops. In the spirit of full disclosure I ditched out of work a bit early today and thought it’d mean I’d catch more daylight for walking, but as it tends to do at this time of the year the sun just dropped and it was dark in no time. So photos suffer from low light as usual.

I’ve been shooting with the GoPro Hero 2 the last couple of days. It has no screen (that’s an optional accessory), so I’m quite enjoying taking photos and having no idea what they look like until I get home. The lens on it is super wide so all of the photos get that distorted fish eye kinda look which I quite like.

I also did a time lapse video with the camera mounted on my dashboard on the way home. You can watch that right now if you like. The song is “I Don’t Care” from Justin Townes Earle’s “Yuma” EP. You should go and buy it.

Here are the photos from today. I put more up over on Begrudgingly Trudging.