MAJs gay bikes [she’s in her fitness era]

seem to only ever ride the all city at the moment, not sure if it's the fact it's the only one downstairs in the shed or the fact it can be locked up. if i was honest i would say it's because it feels a bit vulgar to ride a custom mtb 1000 meters down the road to the coffee shop.

couple of friends and forum faves swung round for coffee at perkyns for a catch up and moan session. the usual topics circulated, the weather, rent, what drugs one had been taking to deal with political pressures on your identity, hows the cancer, having kids. normal stuff. ended in a spin back to my place to try and give away some bike parts before i inevitably move.

was strange catching up with people i hadn't seen in six months or more, i was recounting my liver escepades and it wasn't till it was all falling out of my mouth i realised how insane it was. i mean i'd told people and talked about it over the last few months but it did not really set in. i think it was more presient because it was a couple of days before the big check up with the doctor. after a talk about brass eye i waved off my friends and gave one a waterproof so he didn't catch a chill, locked the bike up and went back to my painting desk.

this was all a couple of days ago, i've seen the doctor now.

they said "hayley, the good news is the lump hasn't grown, the bad news is it's cancer, what's more your liver is a cancer producing machine, the dura ace of cancer producing livers if you will "

i had to blink at this point as it was clear i was imagining things, there is no way this dry oxbridge type with stripey socks cared much about bikes past how bike the panniers were and how much padding the saddle had. he was successful after all, not a pervert.

"forever cancer?" i muttered

he nodded, enthusiastically. this all confused me further because what he was saying did not line up with my years of watching doctor house other than his mannerisms matching a slightly autistic posh boy. he continued from my prompt

"your liver will produce cancer forever, but we can treat them, easily actually and without anesthetic. it's going to be hard to understand this as to be frank with you miss, most my colleagues wouldn't get this"

his voice was reasuring in the way only a very intelegent person with no social skills can be

"every instance is a new cancer, contrary to regular cancer, and we can scan you regularly, as we have been so we can always do it non invasively. we want to hit you with a .." he describes what i imagine is a radio therapy weapon somewhere between marvin the martians blaster and the ray gun from call of duty zombies ".... now my colleagues dismissed this previously and i think it's because they did not understand what it is you have or the effectiveness of this treatment, we have this great new machine, it's just getting sign off because the company went bust"

now to anyone reading im sure this is alarming, the last things you want to hear in the medical room is "your body is unique and we've got this new stuff with low data on it", especially when dealing with radiation. i imagine what you want to hear is you're bang average and we see and cure these things reliably thousands of times. with a body like mine i've come to expect the opposite, i'm in the best research and training hospital in the country and they've got a new doohicky the private patients have paid for. sounds excellent.

"we want to wait till it's bigger, by that time we'll have sign off and can get you booked in, any questions?"

well loads, but more so existntially right now and this did not seem to be the man to have philisophical reflections about life with. although if we were discussing his opinions on overly conservative medical practices over a half pint of bitter im sure he'd be very informative.

I sort of stumbled out the room, got some bloods taken and then walked to my partner in the waiting room to fill them in. what did this all mean? i'm ok but i now live something like a transexual wade wilson? i have to live next to oxford and london indefinately? all seemed like a lot, especially having spent my weekends moaning about rent.

the good news is however i'd have lots of time to ride my fixie still, drink half pints and read a book on a brisk winter afternoon outside a coffee shop quicky being over ran by children with a higher net worth than me.