Today I am doing something I've never done before - I've been asked to act as 'MC' or 'chair' or somesuch (it's all a bit vague really!) for a day conference in a health care setting!  We have evidently 90 delegates registered - clinical nurse specialists, oncologists, professors, psychologists - and I, as one of the lay representatives on the steering group, have been asked to be the front person who keeps the show on the road!  Quite an honour and also quite a responsibility

The conference is part of a project looking at providing appropriate support to people who experience cognitive changes following cancer treatment, what is often referred to as chemo-brain.  The project has run a pilot programme of small groups which have enabled people to normalise their experience, gain an understanding of the condition (and how it is/is not recognised in medical circles) to discover proven strategies and to share hints and tips for coping.

I got involved with this project as a lay rep because of my own chemo-brain/tamoxi-brain experience (still ongoing into its sixth year) and a desire both to better understand the condition and to see what could be done to help other people.

Today will be interesting and challenging, and will make use of many of my transferable skills as a person who spends a lot of time standing at the front of big groups of people.  Looking forward to it, even if it's not exactly a day "off"!

Blogging as displacement activity!

I had what I thought was a great idea for my sermon - I still think it's a great idea - but the draft sermon isn't quite what I want... A re-write or a 'speak off the cuff with a few notes' may yet be the solution.

Small spoiler alert: what do Aldous Huxley, Enid Blyton and William Shakespeare have in common?!

This afternoon our Friendship meeting will be having a Bible quiz... it's been fun preparing some questions for my contribution to this.  Topics include "Bible Arithmetic", "Animals and Birds of the Bible", "Plants in the Bible" and "Places Jesus Went"

Looking forward to seeing how it is received!

With the announcement that there will be a General (Westminster) Election on 8th June, JPIT (Baptists, Methodists, URC & Church of SCotland) have quikcly pulled together this resource to help us in our thinking.

18th April 1990 was the Wednesday after Easter.  I'd just got back to my desk after my lunch break when the phone rang... the news was simply that, after a long illness, my Dad had died.

27 years ago today, when I was 27 years old.  Half a lifetime.

Because of their age difference, my Mum was then not quite 54... whereas I am now 54.

The photo above was taken in May 1963, and is, I think, the oldest surviving one of me with my Dad.

In a few minutes, I will be heading off to conduct a burial of ashes for someone else's mother, who had lived to the remarkable age of 102.

Half a lifetime ago, I'd never have imagined the path my life would take.

Half a lifetime ago, the woman whose service I'm about to take was already an old lady!

Half a lifetime ago...

I'm not sure quite what this post is meant to say, but 18th April 1990 was nice and sunny in Knutsford, and in 2017 and it's equally bright in Glasgow.  Some things change, others stay the same.

Rest peacefully, PBJG.  Rest peacefully GLW.  Each held forever in the embrace of God's love.